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AMERICAN TEACHERS SERIES 



EDITED BY 



JAMES E. RUSSELL, Ph.D. 

DEAN OF TEACHERS COLLEGE, COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY 



THE 

TEACHING OF ENGLISH IN THE ELEMENTARY 
AND THE SECONDARY SCHOOL 

BY 

GEORGE R. CARPENTER 
FRANKLIN T. BAKER 

AND 

FRED N. SCOTT 



The Teaching of English in 
the Elementary and the 

Secondary School 



BY 

GEORGE R. CARPENTER, A.B. 

AND 

FRANKLIN T. BAKER, A.M. 

PROFESSORS IN COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY 
AND 

FRED N. SCOTT, Ph.D. 

PROFESSOR IN THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN 



Utx 



LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. 

91 and 93 Fifth Avenue, New York 
LONDON AND BOMBAY 

1903 



THE LIBRARY OF ' 
CONGRESS, 

Two Copies Received 

APR 13 1903 ! 



<\ Copyright Entry 

Vv. fi - lq C 3 
CLASS OU XXc. No 

COPY B. 



V 



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C K 



Copyright, 1903, 
By Longmans, Green, and Co. 






UNIVERSITY PRESS • JOHN WILSON 
AND SON • CAMBRIDGE, U. S. A. 



Preface 



In our opinion, the teaching of English is still in an imperfect 
state of development. Its aim, its scope, its subject-matter, its 
method are still to be clearly defined and determined. The 
earnest discussion of the teaching of English within the last 
quarter-century has, however, made it necessary to have a suc- 
cinct statement of the issues in question and a careful summary 
of the most sound opinions regarding them. Such a statement 
and such" a summary we have tried to present, for the informa- 
tion and guidance of the novice, and as a convenient book of 
reference for the experienced instructor. It is only, we believe, 
by sympathetic cooperation and by careful discussion and inves- 
tigation that the very pressing problems relating to the instruc- 
tion of our youth in their mother-tongue can be solved. We 
have therefore endeavored to avoid eccentric, dogmatic, and 
personal opinions, and to present the subject in as many of its 
important aspects as possible, helping the reader to see the 
reasonable differences of method and theory, and urging him 
to weigh the arguments on both sides of all doubtful ques- 
tions. Throughout the book we have had in mind, not the 
best schools nor the worst, but rather the great majority of 
schools, whose excellencies and defects alike make them repre- 
sentative. Each writer is directly responsible for his own part 
of the volume, but each has so modified his work by frequent 
conference with the others that the opinions of one are, in gen- 
eral, the opinions of all. 

G. R. C. 
F. T. B. 
March, 1903. F. N. S. 



Contents 



i 

HISTORY AND METHOD 

Chapter Page 

I. The Study of the Mother-Tongue 

G. R. Carpenter 3 

I. Latin and the Vernaculars ....... 5 

II. The Teaching of the Vernaculars in Europe . 26 

III. The Teaching of English in the United States 37 

IV. The General Theory of Instruction in the 

Mother-Tongue 52 

II. English in Elementary Education . F. T.Baker 67 

I. General Conditions 68 

II. The Place of English in the Lower Grades . 75 

III. Primary Reading Matter 81 

IV. The Beginnings of Reading ' * 98 

V. Composition in Elementary Schools . . . . 121 

VI. English Grammar in the Elementary Schools . 144 

VII. Spelling . : 152 

VIII. Literature in the Elementary Schools . . . 155 

III. English in Secondary Education: 

Part I. Language G. R. Carpenter 188 

I. Language: Grammar 190 

II. Language: Old and Middle English . 215 

III. Language: Rhetoric and Composition 218 

IV. Language : Oral Composition ... . 244 

Part II. Literature in the Secondary Schools 

F. T. Baker 250 

Part III. College Entrance Requirements in 

English . . . . G. R. Carpenter 283 



viii CONTENTS 



Chapter Page 

IV. The Course of Study , . . . . F. T. Baker 293 

I. General Principles 293 

II. The Elementary Schools 296 

III. The Secondary Schools 300 



II 

THE TEACHER AND HIS TRAINING. F. N. Scott 

V. The Training of the Teacher 305 

I. General Qualifications 308 

II. Special Qualifications ......... 314 

VI. The Philosophy of the Assignment .... 319 

VII. Essay-Correcting 327 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 345 

INDEX 377 

APPENDIX 381 



History and Method 



CHAPTER I 

THE STUDY OP THE MOTHER-TONGUE 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

I. On the rise of literature in the vernaculars, see the standard histories 
of the English, French, German, and Italian literatures. On the rise 
of the vernacular in education, see 

C. S. Parker. On the History of Classical Education. In Essays on 
a Liberal Education, edited by P. W. Parrar. Macmillan. 1867. 

R. H. Quick. Educational Reformers. Appleton. 1893. 

G. Compayre. The History of Pedagogy. D. C. Heath. 1886. 

G. Compayre. Histoire critique des Doctrines de l'Education en 
France depuis la seizieme Siecle. 1885. 

On the degree of discipline received through the study of Latin and 

Greek, see 

C. E. Bennett and G. P. Bristol. The Teaching of Latin and 
Greek in the Secondary School. Longmans. 1901. Especially 
Chapter I. and the accompanying bibliography. 

II. On the present position of the mother-tongue in modern secondary 
education in Europe, see 

J. E. Russell. German Higher Schools. Longmans. 1899. 
P. E. Bolton. Secondary School System of Germany. Appleton. 
1900. 

0. Greard. Education et Instruction. Enseignement secondaire. 
1889. Especially Vol. II. pp. 1-160. 

J. Texte. Teaching Language and Literature in France. Educa- 
tional Review, XIII. 121. 

1. Carre. L' Enseignement de la Lecture, de l'ficriture et de la 
Langue francaise dans les Iicoles primaires. In Recueil des Mono- 
graphies pedagogiques publiees a l'Occasion de l'Exposition uni- 
verselle de 1889. 1889. Vol. IV. pp. 1-7 1. 

Plan d'Fjtudes et Programmes de l'Enseignement secondaire 
classique. 1900. 
P. H. Dale. The Teaching of the Mother-Tongue in Germany. In 
(English Government) Report from Commissioners, Inspectors, 
and others. 1897. Vol. (XL) XXV. Also printed in Educational 
Department. Special Reports on Educational Subjects. Vol. I. 
1897. 



4 THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 

M. E. Sadler. Problems in Prussian Secondary Education for Boys. 

In Special Reports on Educational Subjects. Vol. III. 1898. 
Curricula and Programmes of Work for Higher Schools in 

Prussia. Issued by the Prussian Minister of Education, 1896. 

Translated in Special Reports (see above). Vol. III. 

III. On the History of the Teaching of English in the United 

States, see 
R. R. Reeder. The Historical Development of School Readers 

and Method in Teaching Reading. Columbia University Press. 

1900. 
Edward Eggleston. The Transit of Civilization from England 

to America in the Seventeenth Century. Appleton. 1900. 

Chapter V. 
J. B. McMaster. A History of the People of the United States. 

Appleton. Vol. V. Chapter XLIX. 
Other information will be found here and there in B. A. Hinsdale's 
Teaching the Language Arts (see next section of the bibliography), 
E. E. Brown's The Making of Our Middle Schools, Longmans, 
1902, and in the various essays on elementary, secondary, and higher 
education in the several States, published in the Circulars of Infor- 
mation of the United States Bureau of Education. See also the 
special references on the history of the separate parts of secondary 
instruction in English, given in Chapter III. 

IV. On the general theory of instruction in the mother-tongue in 
German schools, see the 

Bibliography at the end of Russell's German Higher Schools, 
Chapter XII. 

V. On the general theory of instruction in English, see 

B. A. Hinsdale. Teaching the Language Arts. Appleton. 1896. 

P. Chubb. The Teaching of English. Macmillan. 1902. 

S. S. Laurie. Lectures on Language and Linguistic Method in 

the School. Macmillan, 1899. 
G. H. Palmer. Self-Cultivation in English. Crowell. 1897. 
For references on special parts of instruction in English, see the 
bibliographies in the following chapters. 

The aim of this book is to record and discuss theories with 
regard to elementary and secondary instruction in English now 
held by teachers and students of education. With such a pur- 
pose in view, it would at first seem unnecessary to speak at all 
of Latin and Greek or of French and German. Two considera- 
tions, however, must not be neglected. First, the idea that 
there should be any definite system of instruction in a native 
tongue is of comparatively recent origin and is not even yet 



THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 5 

accepted by all ; and, second, it is clear that, generally speak- 
ing, the theory of instruction in a native language or mother- 
tongue must be virtually the same, whether that tongue be 
English or French or German. It is important, therefore, that 
we should not regard instruction in English as an isolated 
problem. We must, in the first place, consider the long move- 
ment that has led to the breaking down of the theory by which 
all or nearly all systematic linguistic instruction should be given 
by means of Latin and Greek, rather than by means of a ver- 
nacular. In the second place, we must consider the systems of 
instruction in the vernacular now in vogue in one or more of the 
countries of continental Europe, with the hope of deriving some 
profit from foreign experience in analogous problems. 

I. Latin and the Vernaculars 

So accustomed are we to the conception that each modern 
nation or group of sister nations has its own special language, 
common to all or to the great majority of its inhabi- Language and 
tants, that it is with surprise and pity that we read of tte Peo P le ' 
imperfectly civilized Eastern lands, where different classes or 
castes sometimes use widely different dialects and where the 
written language of the learned has little or no connection with 
the speech of the people at large. Yet it is only a few centuries 
since, in each European country, at least two languages were in 
vogue : the vernacular, the despised speech of the lowly ; and 
Latin, the language of literature and of learning. 

In the delightful series of letters on the grammar of the 

English language written by William Cobbett, in 

1817-20, may be found the following bitter protest "Learned" 

Languages. 
against the assumption, common even as late as the 

nineteenth century, that Latin and Greek, as distinguished from 

the modern tongues, are learned languages : — 

"Those languages are, by impostors and their dupes, called 
the learned languages ; and those who have paid for having 
studied them are said to have received a liberal education. 



6 THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 

These appellations are false, and, of course, they lead to false 
conclusions. Learning, as a noun, means knowledge, and 
learned means knowing, or possessed of knowledge. Learning 
is, then, to be acquired by conception ; and it is shown in judg- 
ment, in reasoning, and in the various modes of employing it. 
What, then, can learning have to do with any particular tongue ! 
Good grammar, for instance, written in Welsh, or in the language 
of the Chippewa savages, is more learned than bad grammar 
written in Greek. The learning is in the mind and not in the 
tongue ; learning consists of ideas and not of the noise that is 
made by the mouth. If, for instance, the Reports drawn up by 
the House of Commons, and which are compositions discover- 
ing in every sentence ignorance the most profound, were 
written in Latin, should we call them learned? Should we say 
that the mere change of words from one tongue into another 
made that learned which was before unlearned ? As well may we 
say that a falsehood written in English would have been a truth 
in Latin ; and as well may we say that a certain handwriting is 
a learned handwriting, or that certain sorts of ink and paper are 
learned ink and paper, as that a language or tongue is a learned 
language or tongue." 

Cobbett's defence of the natural rights, so to speak, of a 
modern language, and his refusal to admit that any one tongue 
Rise of the can properly be called " learned " as distinguished 
Vernaculars. f rom ano ther, recall vividly the long period during 
which Latin and Greek were conceded throughout the civilized 
world to be the only fit subjects of linguistic study, and Latin 
declared to be the only suitable medium -for written and oral 
communication among educated men, and especially the only 
sure means for bequeathing thought to posterity. Of this old 
doctrine many vestiges remain. We still speak of the " classical " 
languages, with a half-conscious implication that we thereby set 
them apart as authoritative standards of human speech and 
literature ; we award degrees with Latin names ; commence- 
ment orators still deliver Latin addresses ; the grammar of our 
native tongue is still frequently taught in terms more applicable 
to Latin and Greek than to English ; and the unlettered still 
often feel that he who can read an ancient language must have 
an undisputed title to wisdom. More than all this, Latin is still 



THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE J 

believed, by a strong party of scholars and men of influence and 
authority in Germany, France, England, and the United States, 
to be the most essential element in all sound secondary educa- 
tion. If we would understand, therefore, how and to what ex- 
tent English should be taught in the elementary and secondary 
schools, it will be found necessary, first, to review briefly the 
long process by which English, French, and German — and in 
general the modern tongues of Europe — have come to supplant 
Latin for literary uses ; second, to notice the steps by which the 
modern languages, from a position of complete neglect, have 
arisen to a position of comparative equality, in matters of educa- 
tion, with Latin and Greek ; and, third, to discuss for a moment 
the extent to which, if at all, English, as a typical modern lan- 
guage, may properly supplant Latin and Greek in the training 
of the secondary schools. 

(i) Latin versus the vernaculars in literature. For the nations 
that grew up in Europe on the ruins of the old Roman Empire, 
Latin was, during the early centuries, the official Latint jj e 
language of state and church, the only medium Tongue of 
used in literature or in any formal written or oral Church, 
communication among educated men. It was only after the 
lapse of centuries that the speech of the vulgar, the despised 
dialects of the people at large, came to aspire humbly to such 
uses. Even after nations had grown to consciousness of their 
power and dignity, Latin long remained the medium of royal 
edicts, and its use in diplomacy died out only towards the end 
of the seventeenth century. It was not until the rise of the 
various Protestant sects that the modern languages were regu- 
larly and widely used in public prayer and worship, and Latin 
is still the official tongue of the Roman Catholic Church. 

Literature of real value had been here and there produced in 
the vernaculars from the seventh century on. Our pagan an- 
cestors, the Anglo-Saxons, wove their sombre epic in almost 
complete freedom from the influences of foreign culture, even 
as, at a somewhat later period, their Scandinavian cousins 



8 THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 

wrought their noble eddas and sagas. But these things were 
done in distant corners of the earth. The career of the mod- 
TheWew ern tongues in literature and their direct cora- 

PopSar in petition with Latin for such purposes did not 
Poetry. begin until, yielding to an innate impulse, Pro- 

vence broke forth into pleasant song, in its own rough dialect, 
in the twelfth century. It was followed in divers fashions by 
land after land, and by the middle of the fourteenth century the 
bonds of tradition were, throughout Europe, either broken or at 
least greatly loosened, so far as popular poetry was concerned. 

It was in Italy, where the young humanists were alike men 
of learning and men of letters, that the point of issue between 
Distrust of the tne old tongues and the new was first sharply 
New Tongues. raiged In hig treatise Q n the Vulgar Tongue, 

written while he was maturing the thought of his great poem, 
Dante demonstrated clearly the right, and indeed the duty, of 
the poet to use the vernacular, proclaiming it to be the nobler 
form of speech, because more common, less artificial, and more 
closely associated with actual life. The use of Italian rather 
than Latin in the Divine Co?nedy was thus the somewhat daring 
choice of a far-seeing and clear-thinking man. But even after 
the success of the great epic had been thoroughly tested, 
Petrarch, who had himself won fame as a poet in the vernacular, 
thought meanly of his native language. In 1366, writing to 
Boccaccio, he confesses that in his youth he was led by the 
charm and promise of the " recently discovered " vernacular 
into making great efforts to improve it, but that, " turning the 
matter over in my mind, I concluded at length that I was build- 
ing upon unstable earth and shifting sand, and should simply 
waste my labours and see the work of my hands levelled by 
the common herd." As knowledge grew, and men saw more 
clearly the majesty and power of the world of antiquity, 
scholars came to realize the orderly strength and fitness of the 
Latin tongue, in comparison with what was then the loose and 
irregular character of the modern languages. Though they 
were willing to waive the rights of the older language in such 



THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE g 

trivial matters as popular verses and tales, they were still 
inclined to maintain that it was safer to compose all works of 
learning, on whatever subject, in that tongue which all agreed 
in declaring the most noble, the most serviceable, the most 
exact, and the most durable. It was not to be wondered at, 
therefore, that the learned Erasmus, master of the classic 
idioms, was not ashamed of his essential ignorance of his 
mother-tongue, or that Bacon was unwilling to intrust to the 
yet unproved virtues of English the guardianship of his phi- 
losophy, fearing that "these modern languages," as he wrote 
towards the close of his life, " will at one time or another play 
the bankrupt with books." 

Though men of science may sometimes have shared Bacon's 
fears, however, the whole trend of literature was in the opposite 
direction. In the sixteenth and seventeenth cen- The Opposite 
turies there arose in Italy, France, and England Trend ' 
groups of men who felt convinced that their native tongues 
were worth paying some attention to, and that, if properly 
developed, they would prove fitting instruments for all literary 
purposes. In these countries, then, scholars and men of letters 
devoted themselves to experiments of all kinds for increasing 
the range, effectiveness, flexibility, and system of the modern 
languages. Such efforts, at first following the ancient languages 
as models, were in large measure successful, and by the eigh- 
teenth century Italian, French, and English prose had each 
proved itself a powerful and worthy instrument for the syste- 
matic and effective transmission of thought. So far as literature, 
journalism, and the common necessities of expression were 
concerned, the vernacular had completely won the day. 

(2) Latin versus the vernaculars in education. In the field 

of education development was of necessity much more slow. At 

the outset Latin was the language of all educated „ „ „ 

° & Latin the 

men, the only gate to book knowledge of any sort, Medium of 
J ° t> j 1 Education, 

be the learner rich or poor, noble or merchant or 

peasant. All knowledge was in Latin, and all knowledge 



10 THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 

must, therefore, begin by Latin. Such elementary and sec- 
ondary instruction as existed was given in Latin, and the 
function of the mediaeval university was to teach, likewise in 
Latin, whatever was thought to be worth knowing. Only here 
and there was an attempt made by a commune to instruct its 
citizens, through the medium of its native language, in some 
special particular, as by the Florentine public lectureship on 
Dante in the fourteenth century. It was only a remote nation 
like England, and that only for a brief period, which could 
perceive that the strength of its people lay in its education in 
its natural tongue, as did King Alfred when he expressed his 
wish that " the whole body of free-born youths in the kingdom, 
who possess the means, may be obliged to learn as long as 
they have to attend to no other business, until they can read 
English writing perfectly." 

Progress was almost infinitely slow. Montaigne, who was 
born in 1533, says of his own education, " I was above six 
The Old years of age before I understood either French or 

System. Perigordian [his native dialect] any more than 

Arabic, and without art, book, grammar, or precept, whipping, 
or the experience of a tear, had by that time learned to speak 
as pure Latin as my master himself." Montaigne's father was 
a man of ideas, and had had his son trained by a somewhat 
original method, in that he spared him toil over books and the 
discipline of the rod, which was then supposed to be insepar- 
ably involved, as well it might be, with the successful teaching 
of Latin. But in other respects the instruction of Montaigne 
was not peculiar. The famous Jesuit schools, founded in the 
sixteenth century and long the most famous in France, the con- 
temporary grammar {i.e. Latin) schools in England, and the 
celebrated Strasburg school of Sturm, had practically the same 
object in view, though their methods differed. The aim was that 
the pupil should learn Latin and nothing else. For that purpose 
it was thought essential that he should learn first to read in 
Latin, without previous instruction in the vernacular, and, 
certainly in France and Germany, that he should, even in the 



THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE II 

lowest classes, speak Latin. Except on holidays, boys were to 

be severely punished if they made use of their mother-tongue, 

even in their games. 

In the seventeenth century two great steps in advance were 

taken. In the first place, earnest and open-minded men began 

to see that the native forms of speech were unduly _ „ 

' Tie r irst 

neglected in elementary instruction. In France step in 

° * r i i Advance. 

the wise Jansenists made use of the mother-tongue 

in the lower classes of their famous Port-Royal schools, soon 

closed through the enmity of their great rivals, the Jesuits. In 

Germany, Ratich laid the emphasis, in his somewhat wild 

theory of education, on grounding the pupil first of all in his 

native language, and the less erratic Comenius put in practice 

a system by which the student, after passing the years from 

six to twelve in an elementary school, where he was taught his 

native language, passed on to the Latin school. In England 

little was accomplished by way of progress, but there were men 

who felt that English — even in Shakspere's time — was worth 

some slight attention. Richard Mulcaster, Spenser's teacher 

and the first master of Merchant Taylors, made a strong plea 

for elementary instruction in his native language : — 

" Is it not a marvellous bondage to become servants to one 
tongue for learning's sake, the most part of our time, with loss 
of most time, whereas we may have the very same treasure in 
our own tongue with the gain of most time ; our own bearing 
the joyful title of our liberty and freedom, the Latin tongue re- 
membering us of our thraldom and bondage. I love Rome, 
but London better ; I love Italy, but England more ; I love the 
Latin, but I worship the English. ... If we must cleave to 
the eldest and not to the best, we should be eating acorns and 
wearing old Adam's pelts. But why not all in English ? I do 
not think that any language, be it whatsoever, is better able to 
utter all arguments either with more pith or greater plainness 
than our English tongue is." l 



1 From The First Part of the Elementarie which Entreateth Chiefly 
of the Right Writing of the English Tongue. 1582. Quoted in Morley, 
English Writers, IX. 186. For Mulcaster, see also J. Parmentier, His- 



12 THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 

And in 1659 we find another schoolmaster pleading for the 
use, in the elementary school, of various " delightful books " in 
the mother-tongue, for " by this means children will gain such 
a habit of delight in reading as to make it their chief recreation 
when liberty is afforded them. And their acquaintance with 
good books will, by God's blessing, be a means so to sweeten 
their (otherwise sour) natures that they may live comfortably 
towards themselves, and amiably converse with other persons." 1 

It was not to be expected that the almost universal belief in 
the sufficiency of a purely " classical " education, which was 
The Second ne ^ ty men °f authority all over Europe, and the 
step * corresponding contempt for instruction in the mod- 

ern tongues, would suddenly be altered, even though it was 
more generally acknowledged that elementary instruction was 
best given in the vernacular. It was not. until the nineteenth 
century that much real progress was made, though many influ- 
ences that were eventually effective were slowly gathering force. 
One of these, first clearly evident in the seventeenth century, 
marks the second step in the onward movement, the feeling 
that the mother-tongue should be studied with care and beyond 
the point reached in elementary instruction, but not in the 
schools. Such a feeling was natural in the century which saw 
the full triumph throughout Europe of modern literature in 
prose and verse, and in which progress in government, science, 
and general civilization removed so many of* the old barriers to 
the understanding of the world and the social organism. The 
modern tongues, it was discovered, were serviceable, and should 
therefore be made the subject of study. Discrimination and 
skill in the use of one's language were the mark of the courtier 
and the gentleman. Such qualities, however, were obviously 
not to be acquired in the schools, and Locke, who saw deep 
into the real problem of education, observed that "to speak 



toire de V Education en Angleterre deptits les Origines jusqu'au Commence- 
ment du dix-neuvieme Siecle. Paris, 1896. Chapter IV. 

1 Charles Hoole, master of the grammar school at Rotherham, in 
The Petty-Schoole, 1659. 



THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 1 3 

and write correctly gives a grace and gains a favourable atten- 
tion to what one has to say ; and since it is English that an 
Englishman will have constant use of, that is the language he 
should chiefly cultivate, and wherein most care should be taken 
to polish and perfect his style." A further sign of the same 
widespread and deep-seated sentiment in favor of a training 
that should fit the gentleman for the duties of his station, — a 
sentiment heightened by the deadening and artificial instruction 
of the grammar or Latin schools, — was the founding in Ger- 
many, under French influence, of the Ritterschulen, schools for 
gentlemen, in which Latin was absent or wholly subordinated, 
and the emphasis of instruction thrown not only on manly ex- 
ercises and the arts that beget grace and courage, but on the 
modern languages and on such knowledge as might give one 
power over himself and his fellows. The aim of these schools 
was not always a high one, but it was better than that of the 
instruction which they helped to displace. 

The eighteenth century was rich in educational theorists, and 
it was largely by their inspiration and leadership that the third 
important step was taken, — the introduction of the The Third 
vernacular into secondary education. But much step> 
too was due to the awakening sense of the people at large, 
who, growing alive to their duties and responsibilities as well as 
to their rights, found themselves sundered from the dream-world 
of antiquity and face to face with a new heaven and a new 
earth. It became clear that men who handled things should 
have a different training from men who dealt with words alone. 
The claims of science, history, and philosophy were deeply felt 
and fully recognized. Great ideals of human wisdom, justice, 
and achievement were working in all earnest hearts. The aims 
of " classical " instruction were transformed. Latin and Greek 
were no longer to give to youth mere lip-knowledge, but to 
train them in the discipline and aspirations of the two great 
nations of antiquity. The German classical gymnasia, new 
founded by the side of the decaying Latin schools, became 
noble influences in education. And, best of all, side by side 



14 THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 

with them stood the new Real-schulen, — schools where the real- 
ities of life had their due place. At first they were scarcely 
more than trade schools, or, as they have been well described, 
" manual training schools, in which the scientific principles un- 
derlying the various trades and business vocations should have 
a prominent place." Soon, however, they were given a higher 
scope and standing, and, when the century closed, there were, 
in Germany at least and to a lesser degree in France, two ways 
in which a worthy youth could be further trained, after his in- 
struction in the elementary schools was over, — first, in a secon- 
dary school where the chief instrument was the ancient linguistic 
discipline, and second, in a secondary school no less thorough 
where the chief instrument was science. In both schools the 
mother-tongue received more attention than before, and in the 
second group this was especially the case. 1 

The eighteenth century was thus successful in establishing in 
Germany, and to a less extent in other countries, the beginnings 

of a sound system of secondary instruction that was 
The 
nineteenth not exclusively devoted to the classical languages. 

The task of the nineteenth century was the extension 
and systematization of this policy. How far it has been suc- 
cessful in this we shall consider when we come to discuss the 



1 "The teaching ox" the German language and literature has now been 
firmly established for over one hundred years in fhe higher schools of 
the country. Its recognition stands in direct connection with the growth 
of the German classical literature toward the end of the eighteenth cen- 
tury. Before that time the efforts of educational reformers were chiefly 
directed towards obtaining the removal from school and university prac- 
tice of the stern rule laid down for the Strasburg Gymnasium : Qui sertno7ie 
alio utuntur quam Latino, ratione bond puniantur ! But in 1780-1800 two 
men in very different spheres were working with the same ideal of diffus- 
ing a real knowledge of the national literature. In 1788 the great Prus- 
sian Minister cf Education, Von Zedlitz, built up a systematic course of 
instruction, and gave it a prominent place in the leaving examination ; 
and in a school speech at Weimar, eight years later, Herder welcomed 
the new movement. From that time onward the subject kept its place 
in the gymnasium without dispute." — F. H. Dale, The Teaching of the 
Mother- Tongue in Germany, 362. 



THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 1 5 

present status of secondary instruction in the mother-tongue in 
the principal European countries and in the United States. 
For general purposes it is sufficient here to note that university 
training has everywhere been immensely broadened ; that the 
study of languages other than Latin and Greek, and especially 
the mother-tongue, has reached large proportions, and that 
schools fitting boys specifically for the universities have there- 
fore been led greatly to broaden their curricula. Moreover, the 
strong trend of democratic sentiment and the great change in 
the distribution of wealth have enormously increased the num- 
ber of secondary schools of various kinds whose aim is not 
specifically that of fitting pupils for higher institutions, as well 
as the attendance in such schools. And in these schools, which 
are naturally less under the influence of " classical " tradition, 
there has been a marked tendency to replace Latin and Greek 
in the curriculum by the modern languages and to lay special 
stress on the native language. 

The nineteenth century as a whole, however, has been marked, 
in point of educational theory and practice, and, perhaps espe- 
cially toward its close, by the earnest discussion and Tw0 vital 
investigation of two important questions, — first, Questions, 
whether it would or would not be wiser to decrease greatly the 
use of Latin and Greek as instruments of secondary education, 
or indeed, as a rule, wholly to do away with them ; and, second, 
whether, if this should prove to be the case, it would be possible 
to use the modern languages as a means of securing the mental 
discipline and the other beneficial effects that have long been 
thought to be best secured by training in Latin and Greek. On 
the first question, as might have been expected, there is still a 
wide difference of opinion, not only among experts in education 
but throughout the public at large. That question, moreover, is 
scarcely pertinent to our present inquiry, and has been well dis- 
cussed, where it properly belongs, by Professor Bennett, in the 
corresponding volume of this series on the teaching of Latin 
and Greek in the secondary school. The second question, 
however, — what amount of mental discipline may be secured 



l6 THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 

through the study of the mother-tongue, and how serviceable it 
may be made for educative purposes, — it is proper and indeed 
necessary for us to discuss here. In order to do so we must for 
a moment take up the less pertinent question as to the educa- 
tive value of Latin and Greek. 

(3) Latin versus the vernacular in modern education. The 
many sound arguments in favour of the use of Latin and 
Arguments Greek, or of Latin alone, as instruments of great 
for Latin, value in secondary instruction, may be fairly summed 
up as follows : — 

1. The study of a richly inflected synthetic language is highly 
valuable as a mental discipline. 

2. The study of Greek and Latin is valuable in that it intro- 
duces the student to the two great literatures (outside of 
Hebrew) of antiquity, thus training his taste and giving him 
aesthetic standards that are both elevated and permanent. 

3. It is likewise valuable in that it gives him a knowledge of 
the Graeco-Roman civilization, thus furnishing him the key to 
an understanding of the modern world. 

4. Practice in translation, and especially in translation from 
a highly inflected synthetic language into a modern language, 
gives excellent training in the mother-tongue. 

The principal objections to this set of arguments are the 
following : 1 — 

1. Mental discipline can be as easily secured, so 
jec ons* ^ as can ^ seen ^ by faQ proper study of mathe- 
matics, the physical sciences, history, or other subjects. 

2. Greek literature is beautiful and important, but pres- 
ent systems of instruction do not enable a pupil, at the 
end of his secondary studies, and rarely even at the end of his 
college course, to gain a knowledge of the literature at all pro- 
portionate to the time spent in acquiring it. The value of a 
knowledge of Latin literature is greatly overrated, and can only 
in the rarest cases be considered as repaying the secondary 



1 This point of view is admirably stated in Jules Lemaitre, Opinions 
& ripandre, 1901, pp. 1 17-157. 



THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE IJ 

student for the time consumed, especially when we compare the 
results obtained from the study of the great modern literatures. 

3. For the adequate understanding of the Graeco-Roman 
civilization a knowledge of Greek and Latin is not essential, and 
an understanding of modern civilization does not depend, to any 
marked degree, upon the study of ancient Latin and Greek 
society. 

4. The advantages offered by translation are as easily and as 
effectively obtained through the modern as through the ancient 
languages. Men trained almost exclusively in Latin and Greek 
are quite as likely to write badly as to write well, and training 
in matters of style is best secured through the modern languages, 
which present us models more likely to prove serviceable, be- 
cause more in accordance with the whole structure of modern 
life. 

Each set of propositions, it must be noticed, is held by a 
strong party of scholars and men of letters. With regard to the 
merits of the general question and the relative The Question 
strength of the respective arguments, I do not pre- solved by 
surae to venture an opinion. The whole question, Ex P eneilce - 
I am convinced, is more likely to be solved by practice than 
by theory. Men are now being educated in large numbers, in 
several different countries and especially in the United States, 
through secondary school curricula in which Latin does not 
play an important part, or does not appear at all. It is by their 
fruits that educational systems must inevitably be judged. The 
end of the present century, and very possibly an earlier date, 
will in all probability see the solution of the question, which 
has in one form or another been perplexing humanity for sev- 
eral hundred years. 

There is, however, a matter involved which it is important 
that students and teachers of English should discuss and if 
possible decide. It will readily be seen that the 
claims of the classicists resolve themselves into Question 
these four points : Latin — to take for ease of ex- 
planation the language most under discussion — is almost indis- 



1 8 THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 

pensable as a means of instruction, because of its great value 
(i) as a discipline ; (2) in introducing the pupil to great works 
of literature and in moulding his taste ; (3) in giving him the 
necessary understanding of the social system of which he is a 
part ; and (4) in giving him power over his native tongue. Now 
on all these four points the classicists are flatly contradicted by 
the opposing party ; and on the first three heads it is with great 
difficulty that the classicists can hold their own. Many sub- 
jects of study discipline the mind, — indeed all subjects when 
well taught, and perhaps particularly mathematics and the 
natural sciences. Great works of literature in the modern 
languages are more accessible, more commonly mastered, and 
more generally effective in secondary study. It is to history, 
economics, and social science that we look for our orien- 
tation in modern civilization. But on the point of purely 
linguistic training the classicists still seem to preserve their 
ascendency. We must, therefore, discuss the important and 
pertinent question, — is it possible to obtain by the continuous 
study of English in the secondary school results as satisfactory 
as those obtained through the continuous study of Latin? 
The classicists say no ; and in the great schools of England, 
and until very recently in the great schools of the United 
States, the study of English as such was almost invariably en- 
tirely lacking. What is the truth of the matter at the present 
time ? 

Let us recapitulate. We are not to consider (1) the relative 
merits of the classical languages and other subjects in point of 
Recapituia- discipline ; nor (2) the relative merits of the classi- 
tion# cal and the modern literatures for the purpose in 

hand ; nor (3) the relative merits of Latin and history as helps 
toward the understanding of the modern world. All these 
points lie outside our sphere. We are to consider (4) the rela- 
tive merits of Latin and English as a help toward the under- 
standing and use of the mother-tongue for secondary school 
students. 

Those who hold that Latin is an exceedingly valuable instru- 



THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 1 9 

ment for securing linguistic discipline in secondary training seem 

to do so for the following pre-eminent reasons : l — 

„,, , . T . . . . . . . Latin as a 

i. I he study of Latin trains the linguistic sense, Linguistic 

because Latin is a fully developed, synthetic lan- 
guage, rich in regular inflected forms, and therefore able to give 
the pupil a clear insight into language as a system or organism. 

2. The whole linguistic system of Latin is so completely dif- 
ferent from that of English, the whole process of Latin thinking 
is so different from that of English thinking, that the pupil can- 
not, in the study of Latin, read cursorily and negligently, but 
must bend his mind with perseverance to his task, and learn, if 
at all, by close attention and the exercise of reason. 

3. All translation is profitable exercise, but especially trans- 
lation from Latin into English, for reasons similar to those just 
mentioned. The pupil cannot depend to any great extent on 
words common to the two languages, and is forced to master 
the thought expressed in the Latin, and then to decide just how 
that particular thought may be accurately expressed by means 
of a largely or completely diverse linguistic system. Many go 
so far as to insist that the power over his native tongue which 
the pupil thus acquires is far greater than that acquired by 
original composition in his own language, inasmuch as a sec- 
ondary school pupil can scarcely be supposed to have any but 
crude and indefinite ideas, and is therefore best trained by an 
exercise in which the ideas are already supplied and only ex- 
pression need be thought of. 

On the other hand, it may be said with justice that : — 
1. It is true that English and the modern languages generally 
have not commonly been taught so as to give the linguistic 
discipline which it is well known that we obtain The other 
from the study of a synthetic language. But, Slde * 
though this may establish a presumption, it does not prove that 
an analytic language cannot be taught with similar results. 



1 See especially Bennett and Bristol, The Teaching of Latin and Greek, 
Chapter II. 



2Q THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 

Teachers and scholars are just beginning to understand that 
English is not an unorganized or haphazard linguistic system, 
but is a highly developed and wellnigh perfect instrument for 
the expression of modern thought. That we are already familiar 
with its elements leaves us free to go the more deeply into the 
study of important facts and principles. 

2. No systematic attempt has yet been made to use the 
earlier forms of the language, particularly Anglo-Saxon, as an 
instrument for linguistic training. Anglo-Saxon is of course 
not so richly inflected a tongue as Latin, but it is sufficiently 
different from modern English to require persevering attention 
and application ; and a knowledge of it would be of value and 
interest to the student. The Scandinavian nations are making 
a similar use, in their gymnasia, of Old Norse, which possesses 
an abundant and valuable literature, and the Germans and 
Austrian's a similar use of Middle High German, 1 and it seems 
possible that in due course of time Anglo-Saxon can be used in 
English and American secondary schools with good effect. 

3. Good teachers of English composition would scarcely 
admit that boys of fifteen have few ideas or none. Their ideas 
may indeed be crude, but such terms are relative. The ideas 
of college boys, or even of grown men, might often be similarly 
described. The fact is that the mind of the high school student 
is usually brimming over with ideas, and the problem to which 
the modern teacher of composition addresses himself is not that 
of teaching young people to express mature ideas, but that of 
training them to express their youthful ideas adequately, in 
words just and true. The facts and experiences that form part 
and parcel of a boy's mental life are legitimate subjects for ex- 
pression, and hence for composition ; and it is, we think, being 
daily proved by teachers who work on this basis that training in 
turning these mental facts into words that adequately render 
them forms a discipline quite comparable in effectiveness with 



1 For a discussion of its use in German schools, see, for example, 
R. Lehmann, Der deutsche Unterricht, 1890, pp. 11 5-1 22. 



THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 21 

the time-honoured training of the student in turning into his own 
language, from an ancient language, ideas which he scarcely 
understands or appreciates. It must be kept in mind that the 
best way to treat crude or incoherent ideas is to attempt to ex- 
press them to others. The crudity or incoherence then tends 
to become evident. This natural educative process is involved 
in expression by any medium, but it is especially characteristic 
of written or oral expression in the mother-tongue. 

It would seem from the foregoing discussion that the burden 
of proof lies with the vernacular, which must in every case prove 
itself, by theory and in practice, fitted for use as a The ^ ur ^ en 
subject of instruction. And yet the justice of such of Proof " 
a feeling may be doubted. If the oft imagined inhabitant of 
another planet should have alighted here twenty years ago in 
his journeyings through space, he might be supposed thus to ques- 
tion some interlocutor, in the course of his inquiries about edu- 
cation. Question. And I suppose that in your whole system of 
secondary education, — which is, I understand you to say, 
free and within reach of great multitudes of the people, — you 
throw great weight on instruction in the native language, that as 
many citizens as possible may gain an intelligent appreciation of 
its principles, its beauties, and its niceties ? Answer. Oh, no ! 
we give virtually no instruction in our own language in the 
secondary schools. In the elementary schools we teach chil- 
dren reading and writing and a little grammar, and whatever else 
they need they can pick up for themselves. In the secondary 
schools we try to teach them Latin, the language of a nation that 
flourished some two thousand years ago. Q. But why do that? 
A. The language has long been held in high respect. It was 
for some time, though not later than five or six hundred years 
ago, generally used by educated Europeans, and many words 
from it have become embodied in our own speech. Q. Your 
last remark seems pertinent, though I should suppose you would 
find it wiser merely to give the mass of your secondary pupils 
some instruction in the Latin vocabulary, in the course of their 
instruction in English, rather than to teach them Latin for years 



22 THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 

and not teach them English at all after their childhood is over. 
That seems to me an exceedingly cumbrous method of securing 
a comparatively slight advantage, and much like the antique 
methods of medical practice which you have so recently dis- 
carded. But I can understand how you may manage to give 
your young citizens a fairly thorough and adequate linguistic 
training without insisting on formal instruction in the history and 
principles of the language. They would get the essence of all 
this, perhaps, in the frequent practice which you doubtless give 
them in the use of their native tongue, — in essays and compo- 
sitions. A. Oh, that we consider unnecessary. Such training 
is useless. Our boys and girls of sixteen are almost fools. They 
have nothing to write about in their own language, and so we 
give them little exercises in translating passages from Latin into 
English or easy English sentences to put into Latin. Q. That 
is a very interesting — not to say, astonishing — condition of 
affairs. Still, I have seen in China other somewhat similar sur- 
vivals of ancient customs. I suppose, then, that you confine 
your secondary teaching of English to this marvellous literature 
of yours, which you have been praising so highly and so justly. 
There you have at least a subject of instruction which must 
prove of the greatest value to the people at large. A. No, I 
cannot say that we make any special effort to study our own 
literature in the high schools. Sometimes we have the pupils 
read hurriedly a play or two of Shakspere, but we rely mostly 
on Latin literature. At the best we can, in four years, get them 
to read, somewhat painfully, about three hundred pages of it ; 
but, etc. 

It would be easy to prolong such an imaginary conversation, 
which would aim simply to take the whole subject out of its 
customary setting and thus help us to see it in a more rational 
light. The result of any such attempt to look at the matter 
fairly must, I think, in the present state of modern civilization, 
lead us to see that the burden of proof may justly be laid on the 
classicists, and they be asked to show how and why it is that 
we retain a dead language for purposes of linguistic training 



THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 23 

and neglect our own language. The first and obvious reply of 
the classicists to this general argument would be one drawn from 
experience. Whatever theory may seem to show us, it is un- 
doubtedly true that the apparently roundabout method has been 
successful. For centuries each nation has been trained in its 
native tongue by the study of Latin. Has a nation ever been 
so well trained through its own language ? Such an argument, 
we may reply, would have been some years ago almost unan- 
swerable, though a keen mind might always have suspected that 
experience, as in so many matters of science, was used to sup- 
port a monstrous waste of force. Recent experience, however, 
counts against the classicists. It has been proved that each 
modern language is, to those who speak it, an excellent instru- 
ment for linguistic training. Especially is this true in certain 
parts of the field of instruction in English. Within twenty years 
methods of teaching English composition have been put in 
practice which lead a majority of those interested in educa- 
tion to believe it an exceedingly valuable linguistic disci- 
pline, and within ten years certain American schools have been 
securing equally important results from the teaching of Eng- 
lish literature. Half a century more and we may be able to 
meet the classicists not only on the ground of pure theory, 
where their case is weakest, but also on the ground of national 
experience. 

To sum up in a few words, then, the line of thought expressed 
in the chapter up to this point, we may say: (1) The rightful 
claim of Latin to be considered as the pre-eminent language of 
the educated classes in Europe was broken down in the sixteenth 
and seventeenth centuries, and completely overthrown in the 
eighteenth ; and, similarly, the exclusive claims of Latin to be 
accepted as the most valuable and one indispensable instrument 
of secondary instruction have been gradually weakened, during 
the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, by the increasing value 
set on the study of mathematics, the natural sciences, history, 
and the modern languages. (2) It has become more and more 
evident, from the educational experience of the last twenty-five 



24 THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 

years, that much of the good effect secured through Latin as a 
cultural study may also be secured through the use of history 
and of literature in the modern languages. (3) While the rivals 
of Latin — and especially history and the literature of the native 
tongue — have been thus encroaching upon the reputation it had 
long held as an educational medium, it has become less and less 
certain that Latin could hold its reputation even in the field 
where it has usually been regarded as supreme, as an instrument 
for linguistic discipline. In particular, modern methods in 
English composition seem to show that this is, in proper hands, 
an extraordinarily effective instrument. There is a somewhat 
wide-spread feeling, moreover, that the study of English gram- 
mar, particularly on the historical side, and of the earlier forms 
of the language, may be so systematized as to yield as remark- 
able results as has the recently systematized study of English 
composition. 

Three further facts which have an important bearing on the 
attitude towards Latin of those especially interested in the study 
of English are these : — 

1. A still undisputed claim of Latin on the attention of the 
modern European nations is that it has been the source of so 
large a part of their respective vocabularies. The 
Partof ' Spaniard, the Italian, and, to a somewhat less 
degree, the Frenchman, must know something of 
the Latin vocabulary in order to master their own. This does 
not hold true, to anything like the same extent, of German, and 
especially not of the Scandinavian languages, which are far more 
Teutonic in character. It does hold true of English, the vocabu- 
lary of which is partly Latin, partly Teutonic. To acquire the 
necessary hold on the Latin vocabulary, to feel the force and 
weight of English words on their Latin side, is not, however, a 
task of great magnitude. With modern methods of teaching 
Latin, it can certainly be secured in three years, and it is wholly 
possible that, under teachers trained in English philology as 
well as in Latin, good results could be secured in two years 
or even less. 



THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 2$ 

2. Recent statistics seem to show that, in secondary schools 
in the United States, the study of Latin is increasing. Not only 
are more pupils studying Latin, but the increase is greater than 
would be expected, even taking the natural increase of school 
attendance into consideration. As it must remain very doubt- 
ful whether many of these secondary school students of Latin 
continue their instruction in that subject more than two or three 
years, it seems clear, on the whole, that the study of Latin, as 
now carried on in the secondary schools of the United States, 
should be fostered in every possible way by those of us who are 
primarily interested in the study of the mother-tongue, except 
when the time spent in the study of Latin must be subtracted, 
in large part or wholly, from the time devoted to English. It 
must be borne in mind, moreover, that, when pursued from 
the point of view mentioned just above, the study of Latin is 
as much a part of the curriculum in English as in Latin, and 
in matters of method must eventually be considered primarily 
as an English study. 

3. While teachers of English will thus feel it their duty to en- 
courage the study of Latin to a greater or less degree in the 
secondary schools, they must remember that the ex- The Teaching 
perience of the present century, or even of the stiinnits 1 
next generation or two, may well succeed in estab- Infanc y- 
lishing the fact that English, when properly taught, has an 
educational value that has until recently scarcely been sus- 
pected. It is now being shown in our best schools that 
training in English composition may yield results hardly at- 
tainable through any other means in point of mental discipline. 
The progress now being made in the teaching of English 
literature seems to show that it now serves better than Latin 
and Greek the purpose of awakening and organizing the 
aesthetic side of the boy's nature and of building up in him a 
sound taste for good literature. Similarly, it remains to be seen 
whether the system of teaching the English language now in 
process of development, particularly if it be made to include the 
study of Latin and of Anglo-Saxon — the two great sources of 



26 THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 

our vocabulary — has not a strong chance of supplanting Latin 
as the most convenient and effective instrument for education on 
the linguistic side. It behooves the teacher and the student of 
English, therefore, to pay the utmost attention to the problems 
presented by the teaching of the mother-tongue, treating them 
in a broad way, without prejudice, and with the determination 
to aid as much as possible in the solution of one of the most 
important educational questions of our generation. 

II. The Teaching of the Vernaculars in Europe 

From our brief inquiry into the rise and progress of the 
study of the vernaculars in the secondary schools, and from 

our still briefer inquiry into the relative merits 
English In- 

structionin of the training secured through Latin and through 
Great Britain. . 

a native language, we now pass to the considera- 
tion of the present state of the study of the native languages 
in the principal modern nations. As our main interest lies 
in English, it would be natural to turn our attention almost 
exclusively to England, where, one would suppose, we should 
find such models as we need. Unfortunately, the secondary 
school system of Great Britain, though in certain respects ad- 
mirable, is peculiar in that it holds closely to the methods of 
centuries ago, so far as the relative use of the ancient and the 
modern languages is concerned. In all the great English 
schools Latin and Greek are the chief means employed to 
secure mental discipline and to train the taste and the judg- 
ment in literary and linguistic matters. The current policy 
with reference to the use of Latin and Greek in secondary 
education is still virtually that thus described in the report of 
the Educational Commission of 1864: — 

" For the instruction of boys, especially when collected in a 
large school, it is natural that there should be some one prin- 
cipal branch of study, invested with a recognized and if possible 
a traditional importance, to which the principal weight should 



THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 2J 

be assigned, and the largest share of time and attention given. 
. . . The study of the classical languages and literature at 
present occupies this position in all the great English schools. 
... It is not without reason that the foremost place has been 
assigned to this study. Grammar is the logic of common 
speech, and there are few educated men who are not sensible 
of the advantages they derived as boys from the steady practice 
of Latin composition and translation, and from their introduc- 
tion to etymology. We are equally convinced that the best 
materials available to Englishmen for these studies are furnished 
by the languages and literature of Greece and Rome. From 
the regular structure of their languages, from the comparative 
ease with which their etymology is traced and reduced to 
general laws, from their severe canons of taste and style, from 
the very fact that they are dead, and have been handed down 
to us directly from the periods of their highest perfection, 
comparatively untouched by the inevitable process of degenera- 
tion and decay, they are beyond all doubt the finest and most 
serviceable models we have for the study of language." x 

During the last two decades — and particularly during the 

last decade — there have been many signs of a movement 

toward placing the study of English on a more 

secure footing in English secondary schools. Most Subject 

c ^ .. , , ... Continued, 

of them, it would appear, are now preparing pupils 

for the Oxford or Cambridge local examinations, for the matric- 
ulation examination of the University of London, or for other 
similar tests, which include English grammar, composition, 
and literature. The evidence seems to show, however, (i) that 
preparation for these examinations, so far as English goes, 
is still rather an incident in the work of the schools than 
an essential element; (2) that the schools are inclined simply 
to teach what the examiners are likely to ask for, instead of 
providing a well-proportioned group of English studies ; and 
(3) that what the examiners require is too often not real 



1 Report of Her Majesty s Commissioners appointed to inquire into the 
Revenues and Management of certain Colleges, Schools, and Foundations. 
Vol. I. London. 1864. Reprinted in Barnard, English Pedagogy. 
Second Series. 



28 THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 

knowledge, training, or cultivation of mind, but simply the 
memorizing of comparatively useless facts. 1 

On the whole, it is clear that the great English secondary 
schools, especially in the preparation of candidates for Oxford 
and Cambridge, have remained faithful to the old classical 
traditions. 2 Composition is usually understood as meaning 



1 The last point is well illustrated by the following paper on As You 
Like It, set in the Oxford local examinations for Junior candidates, in 
July, 1900: — 

1. On what occasions does Touchstone appear in this Play? De- 
scribe briefly the part he played on each occasion. 

2. Give the meaning of the following words, and quote the passage 
in which each occurs : allottery, quintain, umber, priser, quotidian, 
leer, hurtling, thrasonical. 

3. Describe the character of either (a) Jaques or (3) Rosalind. 

4. Give an account of the plot of this play. 

5. By whom and on what occasions are the following mentioned in 
this Play ? — Robin Hood of England, Juno's swans, all the firstborn 
of Egypt, Gargantua's mouth, Leander. 

6. Quote either the passage beginning " And one man in his time 
plays many parts" and ending "The sixth age shifts into the lean and 
slippered pantaloon; " or, the passage beginning " Hath not old custom 
made this life," etc., and ending " I would not change it." 

See also the essay on " The Teaching of English Literature," in 
D. C. Tovey, Reviews and Essays in English Literature, Bell, 1897. 

2 All who have studied the English secondary schools seem agreed 
on this main point of difference between the English educational system 
and that of other countries. See, for example, J. J. Findlay's " Education 
in England," in Beiblatt zur Anglia, Nov. 1, 1891," p. 236. Even in the 
" modern " (non-classical) course, English apparently amounts to little. 
Indeed, the term " English " seems often to be applied to history, 
political economy, or any subject studied in the native language. The 
latest Royal Commission on Secondary Education (1895) nas little to 
say about the matter except that " it is now generally agreed that 
besides that literary and humanistic course of instruction, based upon 
the languages of classical antiquity, which tradition has established 
among us, and whose incomparable value no thoughtful man denies, ample 
provision must be made for scientific teaching. ... It is further agreed 
that . . . the chief tongues of Europe ought to be studied not only as 
instruments of linguistic training but as the keys to noble literatures." 
Report of the Commissioners, 1895, I. 284. 

It is only within the last few years, and after much debate, that 
instruction in English, and particularly in English literature, has been 



THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 29 

Latin composition, and such practice as is sometimes given 
in essay writing is cursory and incidental. The efforts of 
educational reformers appear to be almost exclusively directed 
to pressing the claims of the modern foreign languages and of 
the sciences, and to the attempt — so far without complete 
success — -to obtain an organized system of elementary and 
secondary instruction similar to that established in all other 
civilized countries. Such training in their native language as 
English boys receive in the secondary schools is thus almost 
entirely confined to what may be obtained incidentally in the 
course of their instruction in Latin and Greek, in accordance 
with the theory enunciated by Thomas Arnold, who declared 
that " every lesson in Greek or Latin may or ought to be made 
a lesson in English ; the translation of every sentence in 
Demosthenes or Tacitus is properly an exercise in extempo- 
raneous English composition, — a problem how to express with 
equal brevity, clearness, and force, in our own language, the 
thoughts which the author has so admirably expressed in his." 
The typical English schools of to-day may, therefore, be de- 
scribed, so far as the teaching of the English language and liter- 
ature goes, as in much the same condition as were English as a 
the old New England classical academies, such as B y- product - 
Phillips Andover and Phillips Exeter, up to within a few years. 
At their best, they teach English through Latin, securing such 
knowledge and training as is necessary as a sort of by-product. 
The reader must be careful, however, not to infer that, because 
English is not explicitly taught in classical schools of this sort, 



admitted to any recognized place in British universities. See J. C. 
Collins, The Study of English Literature, Macmillan, 1891, and "English 
Literature and How to Study It," Pall Mall Gazette extra, No. 32, Jan. 
20, 1887. The absence of plan in secondary instruction in English in 
Great Britain can be seen in P. A. Barnett's Teaching and Organization 
with special Reference to Secondary Schools, Longmans, 1897. One of 
the few attempts to introduce modern methods in the teaching of English 
composition is L. C. Cornford's English Composition, a Manual of 
Theory and Practice, Nutt, 1900. Reviewed (unfavourably) in The 
[London] Academy, Nov. 24, 1900. 



30 THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 

the pupils are necessarily deficient in the power of using their 
native tongue with correctness and skill. This may or may not 
be the case. Ability to speak a language correctly depends 
more upon home influences and out-of-school associations than 
upon school training. The habit of talking and writing sensi- 
bly, which may be secured through drill in English composition, 
may also be secured indirectly through any or all kinds of sound 
mental discipline. In the English secondary schools a far 
greater number of pupils come from well-to-do or educated 
families than in the United States. It is not to be wondered at, 
therefore, that in many cases English boys who have not been 
trained in English speak and write as correctly as American or 
German boys who have had the advantage of a considerable 
amount of instruction in their native language ; nor would such 
a state of things count against those who are in favour of mak- 
ing the mother-tongue one of the most important elements in 
secondary education. 

British conservatism in education, which results in her making 
use of Latin and Greek in education to the almost complete 
The Native exclusion of English, forces us to look elsewhere, if 
Continental 11 at a ^> f° r our m °dels in the teaching of a native 
Europe. language. In elementary instruction the mother- 

tongue is, throughout the civilized world, given special promi- 
nence and attention. It is in regard to its use in secondary 
education that there is a difference in national opinion. In 
England, as we have seen, it is virtually dispensed with. On 
the Continent of Europe, however, we find a different state of 
affairs. The favoured schools in most countries are, to be sure, 
the institutions in which Latin and Greek are made the most 
important subjects of instruction. With almost no exceptions 
throughout Continental Europe, public opinion and govern- 
mental regulation treat men in whose education neither Latin 
nor Greek has played a part as relegated to a lower sphere of 
life and as practically to be excluded from the "learned" pro- 
fessions. On the other hand, in contrast to English conditions, 
there is apparently no system of recognized secondary instruc- 



THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 3 1 

tion in any other European state which does not possess, run- 
ning from the lowest class through the highest, a definite, well- 
planned, and carefully graded course of instruction in the 
language and literature of the native tongue. 

It is at first surprising to find that this is the case not only in 
France and Germany, but in the less conspicuous nations. The 

statistics given in such works, however, as Bau- 

» tt -,7 7 7 r^ ■ 7 , ,, .7 The General 

meister s Jianabucn aer Jbrziehungs una Ufitemchts- Situation in 

lehre fur h'ohere Schulen, show that in Russia, in Europe. 
Hungary, in Belgium, as well as in all the Scandinavian countries, 
— in short, wherever there is a strong national sentiment, — 
liberal provision is made for the study of the mother-tongue 
throughout the secondary course. Such study includes thorough 
instruction in the grammar of the language, practical and histor- 
ical, in composition in the native tongue, in the history of the 
national literature, and in the reading and study of a large num- 
ber of selected masterpieces. Some attention to the earlier 
forms of the language and to the older literature is almost in- 
variably given. Many or all of these systems will repay careful 
examination. For lack of space, however, we must confine 
ourselves to a brief summary of the course of secondary in- 
struction in the mother-tongue now current in Germany. 1 

German secondary schools are divided into three main 
classes : the Gymnasien or classical schools, in which Latin and 
Greek are the main objects of instruction ; the Real- 
gymnasien, in which Latin is required but not Greek, the study of 
and which therefore answers to the ordinary classi- 
cal course in the American high school ; and the Real-schulen, 
in which neither Latin nor Greek is required. In the first, the 
time allotted to German is now, in Prussia, about three hours 
a week ; in the second and third, slightly more, but not quite, 
on an average, four hours. The amount was formerly somewhat 



1 Full and definite information regarding German secondary instruc- 
tion in the native language may be found in the admirable books of 
Professor Russell and Mr. Bolton, to which the reader is referred for 
further details. 



32 THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 

less in all of these, having been increased by the ministerial re- 
script of 1892, to effect which the present emperor, then in the 
early years of his reign, used his strong influence, declaring 
in very noble words 1 that German schools should breed Ger- 
man citizens and soldiers, with an understanding of the national 
language and a love and appreciation of the national literature. 

It will be noticed that good American high schools and acad- 
emies give as much time as this to English, and that some of 
the best give even more. The advantage which Germany has 
over the United States in this respect, therefore, is merely that 
all authorized German schools are required to allot so much 
time to German, and actually do so, whereas in the United 
States many schools lag far behind their more enlightened 
brothers. Three hours a week throughout the course may, 
then, be regarded as all that is necessary to accomplish the 
objects which modern education has in mind in the study of 
the mother-tongue in secondary schools. 2 

With regard to the qualifications of teachers German regula- 
tions are infinitely superior to our own. Teachers of any sub- 
Qualifications J ect must have finished their gymnasium course, 
of Teachers. an( j h ave S p en j- a j- ] eas |- three years in university 

study. The average is four or five years of university study. 
That is to say, translating the requirements into terms appli- 
cable to American education, teachers must have spent six to 
seven years in undergraduate and post-graduate study. In ad- 
dition, they must have passed a severe state examination, which 
tests (1) their understanding of philosophy, psychology, and 



1 "Whoever has been in the gymnasium himself, and has caught a 
glimpse behind the scenes, knows what is lacking there. Above all the 
national basis is lacking. We must take the German language as the 
foundation for the gymnasium ; we should educate national young Ger- 
mans and not Greeks and Romans. We must depart entirely from the 
basis that existed for centuries — from the old monastic education of the 
Middle Ages, where the standard was Latin with a little Greek added." 
Quoted in Bolton, Secondary School System in Germany, p. 154. 

2 Provided, of course, that correct habits of expression are inculcated 
in all other subjects of study. 



THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 33 

education ; (2) their scholarship in the field in which they have 
specialized, and in which they wish to give instruction ; and 
(3) their knowledge of some allied subject, such as English 
or French in the case of teachers of German. The specific 
requirements for teachers of German are summarized as follows 
by Mr. Bolton : — 

" Without going into details concerning the qualifications 
required for teachers of the mother-tongue, it will suffice to say 
that no mere ability to recite grammatical or rhetorical rules, 
nor a simple smattering of literature is deemed sufficient. No 
dilettanteism is allowed. Nothing short of a thoroughly critical 
knowledge of the linguistic science of the language and the 
ability to make scholarly literary criticism will be accepted. 
The historical development of the language must have been 
studied, and also that of the languages from which it has been 
derived. Gothic, Old High German, and Middle High German 
must be easily read and understood, and some acquaintance 
with their literature must have been acquired." x 

The extraordinary differences between the conditions thus 
indicated and those existing in the United States will be appar- 
ent when we reflect that, taking the country up and down, 
certainly half our high school teachers of English have not had 
even college instruction in that subject, much less university 
instruction ; have no special knowledge of the history of our 
language and literature ; and are incompetent, from any rational 
point of view, to give thorough instruction in their native tongue. 
Certainly not one-tenth of tliem, in spite of the rapidly increas- 
ing strictness of our city and state boards of education, have 
qualifications corresponding to those required by law of every 
teacher of German in Germany. The German requirements, 
like the German system, savour of pedantry, but it will be long 
before we can secure, in our own secondary schools, teachers so 
broadly educated and well informed on their special subjects. 

The aims to be kept in view by the secondary Aimsof 
teacher of German are thus stated in the Prussian Instruction. 
regulations : — 

1 Bolton, Secondary School System of Germany, 65. 

3 



34 THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 

11 Next to religion and history, German is the subject which 
is of the greatest moral importance in the organic life of our 
high schools. The task assigned to it is one of peculiar diffi- 
culty, and the necessary conditions for its successful accom- 
plishment are a thorough comprehension of our language and 
history on the part of the teacher, an enthusiastic admiration 
for the treasures of our literature, and a deep sense of patriot- 
ism, whereby he may be able to instil into the sensitive hearts 
of our young people enthusiasm for the German language, for 
the German people, and for the greatness of the German 
intellect." x 

Such statements have undoubtedly a naive air, and give one 
the idea that the conception of German greatness thus imparted 
to the pupil must be both mechanical and sentimental ; but at 
bottom the principle is sound. There is no better way of 
bringing young people to realize the essential elements of na- 
tional life and character than through the careful, loving, and 
systematic study of the national language, the national literature, 
and the national history. What Prussia thus explicitly an- 
nounces as a part of the governmental policy is, explicitly or 
implicitly, a part of educational policy in all the great European 
nations, except England. In the United States we clearly 
must insist on a more general and systematic adoption of the 
same policy. 

A further point in which we may with advantage study the 
treatment of the mother-tongue in Germany is that of the gen- 
The System of eral mterest in tne organization of this branch of 
Instruction, teaching as a system. American educational peri- 
odicals contain numerous articles on special points connected 
with the teaching of English, and there are several books deal- 
ing with the subject as a whole ; but these articles and trea- 
tises are almost without exception the result merely of individual 
or local experience. Each expresses a different point of view, 
and has little in common with others. This is perhaps espe- 
cially the case with articles on English in the secondary schools, 

1 "Curricula and Programmes of Work for Higher Schools in 
Prussia," in Special Reports on Educational Subjects, III. 271. 



THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 35 

about which there were no signs of a common basis of agree- 
ment, in point of method or system, until the appearance of the 
much discussed report of the Committee of Ten in 1894. In 
this respect the Germans are more fortunate ; they have years 
ago passed from the stage of aimless discussion of individual 
fancies and local preferences to a stage characterized by a gen- 
eral consensus of opinion on essential matters, and to a convic- 
tion that the teaching of the mother-tongue, from first to last, 
can be well planned and well executed only when all its parts 
are considered in their logical relations as members of a single 
organism. 1 

Systematic descriptions of the German course of study in the 
mother-tongue may be found in the article by Mr. Dale and the 
works by Mr. Bolton and Professor Russell. Pro- course of 
fessor Russell's chapter on this subject, in particular, study - 
should be read and pondered by every one intending to teach 
English in the secondary schools. The essential characteristics 
of the course of study arenas follows : — 

(1) As has been said, it is, from beginning to end, a well- 
planned and well-balanced system, the result of the experience 
of more than half a century. 

(2) It is virtually the same for students preparing for the uni- 
versity and those preparing for professional or business life. 

(3) It is not divided into " language " and "grammar" and 
"literature" and "rhetoric" and "composition," and other 
small portions. It is a course in German, but in it one element 
after another is given the attention it deserves. 

(4) Grammar is taught indirectly and progressively in con- 
nection with the study of literature and not by disconnected 
sentences. 



1 For German theories as to methods of teaching German, see the 
works mentioned in the bibliography at the head of this chapter, and 
the references appended to Chapter XII. of Russell's German Higher 
Schools, especially the articles in Baumeister's Handbuch der Erziehungs- 
und Unterrichtslehre fur hbhere Schulen and Rein's Encyklopadisches 
Handbuch der Pddagogik. 



36 THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 

(5) Emphasis is laid, throughout the course, on oral compo- 
sition, particularly in the form of paraphrase and of full answers 
to leading questions in recitations in all subjects. 

(6) The foremost element is always literature, studied largely 
through carefully graded reading-books, which are prepared 
with a view to giving the pupil a knowledge of the best, the most 
suitable, and the most inspiring parts of his native literature. 

(7) Correct and accurate use of language is insisted upon in 
all subjects. 

(8) During the period of elementary and secondary educa- 
tion, which may be considered as closing with the seventh year 
of the gymnasium course, i.e.,obersecanda, a great deal of ground 
is thus covered, as will be indicated by the course of study out- 
lined for obersecunda : — 

" (a) Composition at home and in class ; shorter essays on 
topics drawn from the general instruction ; about eight essays in 
the school year, (b) Introduction to the Nibelungenlied in the 
original text ; the courtly epic and lyric, (c) General review of 
styles of poetry, (d) Reading of Dramas : Wallenstein, Egmo?it, 
Goetz. (e) Occasional committing to memory of selections 
from the reading ; original discourses by the students upon the 
contents of the more significant poems of middle-high German 
and of modern dramas." 

Such, in its main outlines, is the instruction in the mother- 
tongue in Germany. We have seen that in England similar in- 
struction is unsatisfactory and incomplete, owing to 
Summary. 

the peculiar character of the education given in the 

great " public " schools and the general lack of organization in 
the elementary and secondary school system. In France, and 
in the other important European countries, the plan, aim, and 
system of instruction are much the same as in Germany. Hav- 
ing now some idea of the importance given to the subject in 
other lands, and of the system in vogue there, we may turn to 
the development of similar instruction in the United States. 



THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 2>7 

III. The Teaching of English in the United States 

The situation in the United States was from the first in many- 
respects different from that in Europe. The colonists, especially 
those emigrating for political or religious reasons, 

had broken away — at least, in many points — from Weakening: 
-r. ,. . . r . . „ of Tradition. 

European traditions in matters of thought. Capa- 
ble of conceiving of another order of things than that existent 
in politics and religion, early forced to depend on their own 
resources and to adapt themselves and their desires to the 
requirements of a new environment, they had obviously the 
advantage of being less influenced by systems of education 
which had already lost their value. It was natural that, from 
the eighteenth century on, there should have been a strong 
American party disbelieving in the old w classical " training and 
having ready at hand a supposedly sufficient substitute. Frank- 
lin, always so typical of the New England and the Middle 
States, wrote, in 1789, the following justification of a plan 
formulated by him in 1749 -, 1 — 

"The origin of Latin and Greek schools among the different 
nations of Europe is known to have been this : That until be- 
tween three and four hundred years past there were no books in 
any other language ; all the knowledge then contained in books, 
viz., the theology, the jurisprudence, the physic, the art military, 
the politics, the mathematics and mechanics, the natural and 
moral philosophy, the logic and rhetoric, the chemistry, the 
pharmacy, the architecture, and every other branch of science, 
being in those languages, it was, of course, necessary to learn 
them as the gates through which men must pass to get at that 
knowledge. 

"The books then existing were manuscript, and these conse- 
quently so dear that only a few wealthy, inclined to learning, 



1 Observations Relative to the Intentions of the Original Founders of the 
Academy in Philadelphia. Reprinted, with a discussion of Franklin's 
ideas on education, in F. C. Thorpe's Benjamin Franklin and the Univer- 
sity of Pennsylvania, Bureau of Education, Circular of Information, No. 
2, 1892, pp. 39 ff. The original plan is described in the same treatise, 
PP- 3 6ff - 



38 THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 

could afford to purchase them. The common people were not 
even at the pains of learning to read, because, after taking that 
pains, they would have nothing to read that they could under- 
stand without learning the ancient languages, nor then, without 
money to purchase the manuscripts ; and so few were the 
learned readers sixty years after the invention of printing that it 
appears by letters still extant between the printers in 1499 tnat 
they could not throughout Europe find purchasers for more than 
three hundred copies of any ancient authors. But printing be- 
ginning now to make books cheap, the readers increased so 
much as to make it worth while to write and print books in the 
vulgar tongue. At first these were chiefly books of devotion 
and little histories. Gradually several branches of science be- 
gan to appear in the common languages, and at this day the 
whole body of science, consisting not only of translations from all 
the valuable ancients, but of all the new modern discoveries, is 
to be met with in those languages, so that learning the ancient 
for the purpose of acquiring knowledge is become absolutely 
unnecessary. 

"But there is in mankind an unaccountable prejudice in 
favour of ancient customs and habitudes, which inclines to a 
continuance of them after the circumstances which formerly 
made them useful cease to exist. A multitude of instances 
might be given, but it may suffice to mention one. Hats were 
once thought a useful part of dress ; they kept the head warm 
and screened it from the violent impression of the sun's rays, 
and from the rain, snow, hail, etc., though, by the way, this was 
not the more ancient opinion or practice. From among all the re- 
mains of antiquity, the bustoes, statues, basso-relievos, medals,etc, 
which are infinite, there is no representation of the human figure 
with a hat or cap on, nor any covering for the head, unless it be 
the head of a soldier, who has a helmet ; but that is evidently 
not a part of dress for health but as a protection from the strokes 
of a weapon. 

'•At what time hats were first introduced we know not, but 
in the last century they were universally worn throughout 
Europe. Gradually, however, as the wearing of wigs and hair 
nicely dressed prevailed, the putting on of hats was disused by 
genteel people, lest the curious arrangements of the curls and 
powdering should be disordered, and umbrellas began to supply 
their place ; yet still our considering the hat as a part of the 
dress continues so far to prevail that a man of fashion is not 
thought dressed without having one, or something like one, 
about him which he carries under his arm. So that there are a 



THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 39 

multitude of the politer people in all the courts in capital cities 
of Europe who have never, nor their fathers before them, worn 
a hat otherwise than as a chapeau bras, though the utility of such 
a mode of wearing it is by no means apparent, and it is attended 
not only with some expense but with a degree of constant 
trouble. The still prevailing custom of having schools for teach- 
ing generally our children in these days the Latin and Greek 
languages I consider therefore in no other light than as the 
chapeau bras of modern literature." 

The early American colonists, and particularly the New Eng- 
land colonists, were early moved to provide for the elementary 
teaching of the mother-tongue. The development E i ementary 
of the instruction in English given in American Schools, 
schools, from the colonial days to the present time, may be best 
treated under the successive heads of elementary schools, classi- 
cal schools, academies, high schools and colleges. In the opinion 
of the New Englanders it was indispensable that the citizen 
should be able to read and to write. Especially must every citi- 
zen be able to read, for otherwise he would not be able to 
understand the civil law, as laid down in the statute books of 
the state and the community, nor, more important yet, would 
he be able to understand the law of God as revealed in the 
Scriptures. In 1642 and 1647 ^ avvs were passed in Massachu- 
setts expressly stating these political and religious reasons 
for the study of English and establishing schools for that pur- 
pose in all townships of more than fifty households. It is a tra- 
dition that, in some isolated communities, children then used 
birchbark for paper and were taught in turn by the educated 
adults. In the eighteenth century, during the long period of 
political disturbance, the elementary schools languished, but 
they revived in the subsequent period of peace and prosperity. 
For two centuries the instruction, according to the old saying, 
consisted of the three R's, reading, writing, and arithmetic, — a 
fact which implies that practically two-thirds of the attention 
was given to the study of the native language. This study was, 
in many respects, unintelligent. The method of learning to read 
savoured of the Middle Ages. Children were taught to spell in 



40 THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 

the most cumbrous way imaginable. There was a similar waste 
of time and effort in the instruction in writing. The other 
branches of English study were simply grammar and exercises 
in reading. The grammar, in accordance with the ideas of the 
time, was artificial in the extreme, and eventually aroused a pro- 
found reaction against any formal system of grammatical teach- 
ing. The reading was carried on in an equally artificial way, 
was largely elocutionary in its basis, and had nothing of the 
value of an approach to literature. Even under these cir- 
cumstances, with methods so primitive, the fundamental ob- 
jects were roughly accomplished, and, throughout the United 
States, children of school age learned the two great hereditary 
secrets of civilization — the art of reading and the art of 
writing. It was not until late in the nineteenth century that 
the people as a whole awoke to the fact that the elementary 
school system must be greatly improved. Instruction in Eng- 
lish, from about 1870 on, changed rapidly. At first it was 
the large city schools, or those in favoured communities, that 
were thus re-organized, but the new ideas spread quickly, and 
at the present time in a large part of the country, elementary 
instruction in English is organized and carried on in an intelli- 
gent way. 

And yet it is just to say that, in spite of antique and barbarous 
methods, the old training in English was often extremely suc- 
The Intern- cessful. This was partly due.to the influence of the 
01J com-* 6 commurnt y. In an exceedingly interesting and im- 
munities, portant essay on Early Common Schools of New 
England, 1 Dr. A. D. Mayo says of the old New England schools 
and communities what was at a later period equally true of many 
Western schools and communities : — 

" The one fact apparent to every well-informed person in this 
period of the life of New England in general, and Massachu- 
setts in particular, is that there was in every region of society a 
profound respect for education and a universal habit of rever- 



1 In U. S. Educational Report, 1894-895, II. 1551-1615. 



THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 41 

ence for an educated class. In every little town, however 
backward, there were children and youth whose proficiency in 
the common school and love for study made them conspicuous, 
' the town talk.' The deep interest with which the progress of 
such a boy or girl was watched, and the great efforts of parents, 
friends, often strangers, to aid any capable and aspiring student 
in ' getting an education,' were a beautiful feature of the town 
life. The clergy were especially noted for this patriotic spirit. 
They were generally members of the school committees and 
often watched the schools with sleepless vigilance. Their sons 
and daughters were often the teachers, and every country min- 
ister of any pretension to scholarship drew about him a group of 
bright young people for mental improvement, often ' fitting for 
college ' those who were unable to pay the expense of attend- 
ance on a classical seminary. The district school shared with 
the church the constant interest of the people in all save ex- 
ceptional towns. In the dearth of popular amusements and 
an exciting outward life, its goings on were canvassed in every 
household, and the influence of the superior people was a 
powerful factor in its success. 

" The college and academy were at that time a far more pro- 
nounced subject of general interest than at present. There 
was, in the rural districts and the villages, practically no element 
of population supplied from ' foreign parts,' and no organized 
religion opposed to the prevailing Protestant church. . . . Not- 
withstanding the dearth of books for general circulation and 
the feeble estate of journalism, there were still, in almost every 
town, small collections of good English literature accessible to 
every eager youth. It was a fixed habit of the men to meet at 
the village store, the shoemaker's, blacksmith's, and carpenter's 
shops, the various mills, especially the gristmill and sawmill, to 
hear the weekly ' paper ' read, and to thoroughly discuss its 
contents, and this kept alive an intense interest in the discus- 
sion of all affairs of public and local interest. A New England 
town of one thousand people, seventy-five years ago, with a 
village at the centre of half a hundred houses, during the long 
winter months shut up from travel, with all its energies turned 
in upon itself, was a battery of electric brains. Men, women, 
and the older children were in constant social communication, 
meeting often several times a week at church, lyceum, and 
visiting ; kept alive by a vital interest in all things important to 
a good community. The one unfortunate habit of ' drink,' 
which was the scourge of so many of these places, had not yet 
undermined the personal virtue of the people to a dangerous 



42 THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 

degree ; and the old-time style of personal self-respect, of non- 
interference with the rights, opinions, and even prejudices of 
neighbours and townsmen, so favourable to the growth of practi- 
cal good living, original thinking, and common sense, was a 
prodigious power in shaping the peculiar life of the New 
England town. And there can be no question that the 
teachers of the district schools in New England during this 
period were drawn from a superior grade of the population, 
and in many instances were more competent than at the present 
time." 

It is not, then, safe to assume that the work done with such 
simple implements was badly done. The soil was fertile. Or, 
Textbooks t0 cnan g e tne figure, the boys of those days, with 
and Results, minds unspoiled and attention undistracted, were 
able to extract, from such crude books and primitive teaching, 
the needed intellectual nutriment, as hardy bodies gain strength 
from coarse and scanty fare. Men trained in the old schools 
were no weaklings, and it does not require research to under- 
stand that the old textbooks and the old methods, while includ- 
ing much that was harmful and false, contained also much that 
was true, stimulating, educative. The old Webster's spelling- 
book sprang from the profound conviction of the author that a 
nation of freemen must know the outward form of the words 
that composed their language ; and the drill based on it, like 
mental arithmetic, cultivated quickness and acuteness of mind 
and accurate grasp of memory. The old grammars had a 
similar but a higher aim. Every boy and girl, to be worthy of 
his lot or hers, must understand the syntactical relations that are 
the logic of language ; and the endless drill in parsing and analy- 
sis, often distasteful, usually resulted in giving the intelligent 
pupil an iron grasp upon the essentials of sentence structure. 
Of the old readers even more can be said. School children 
then read little and they read mechanically, but they frequently 
found in their well-thumbed textbooks the most inspiring litera- 
ture of their race and their time. Abraham Lincoln, a man of 
few books, said of Lindley Murray's English Reader, that " it 
was the best school book ever put into the hands of an Ameri- 



THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 43 

can youth ; " l and there are many to bear witness of the intense 
enjoyment and stimulus derived both from the readers com- 
piled (1820-1830) by John Pierpont, 2 which were the first to 
avail themselves of the new literature of the rising romantic 
school of Irving and Bryant, and of Scott, Byron, and Camp- 
bell, and from the more crude but still excellent First School 
Reader of Noah Webster, the patriotic American Preceptor 
(1794) and CoIumbia?i Orator (1797) of Caleb Bingham, and 
the widely used series of W. H. McGuffey (1850). 

The colonists were not, however, without a deep respect for 
classical learning, and the Massachusetts laws of 1642 and 1647 
provided for the establishment, in townships of a The Classical 
hundred or more families, of Latin or " grammar " Scll00ls - 
schools on the old English model, in order that certain chosen 
citizens should be taught the " learned " languages as a gate to 
the " learned" professions ; and similar schools were founded in 
many other places throughout the country. Like the elementary 
schools, the Latin schools declined during the troubled period 
of the eighteenth century ; unlike the elementary schools, how- 
ever, they fortunately never recovered their former status, being 
rapidly supplanted by the new and interesting institution known 
as the academy. 



1 W. H. Herndon's Lincoln, 37. 

2 It is impossible to avoid quoting a few noble sentences from Pier- 
pont's preface to the first edition of the American First Class Book, which 
indicate the patriotic fervour which pervades the book : " Our country 
both physically and morally has a character of its own. Should not 
something of that character be learned by its children while at school ? 
Its mountains and prairies and lakes and rivers and cataracts ; its shores 
and hill-tops that were early made sacred by dangers and sacrifices and 
deaths of the devout and the daring ; it does seem as if these were 
worthy of being held up as objects of interest to the young eyes that 
from year to year are opening upon them, and worthy of being linked 
with all their sacred associations to the young affections, which sooner 
or later must be bound to them, or they must cease to be what they now 
are, — the inheritance and abode of a free people ! " Quoted in R. R. 
Reeder's Historical Development of School Readers and Method in Teach- 
ing Reading, which gives the latest and best account of the whole 
subject. 



v 



^> 



44 THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 

The policy of establishing endowed schools, attendance at 
which should not be confined to residents in a given community, 
The and in which the young men of the country at large 

Academies. could be thoroughly educated, whether they intended 
to go to college or not, seemed to spring up almost spontane- 
ously in several of the northern colonies, and particularly in 
Massachusetts. The main idea was derived from the similarly 
named institutions established in England, from the latter part 
of the seventeenth century on, by the dissenting bodies, whose 
children were not then admitted to the Latin schools or the 
universities. In America, as in England, academies were in- 
tended partly to take the place of the local Latin schools. There 
was, however, another element in their constitution which was 
particularly appropriate in a new country, namely, the concep- 
tion that they might furnish an appropriate general education 
for boys not entering the learned professions. This idea was 
best developed by the fertile mind of Benjamin Franklin, who, 
in 1749, proposed the founding in Philadelphia of an academy 
which was to give a sensible, practical education to young men 
intended for a commercial life. 1 Latin, he held, was unneces- 
sary for such students, and a thorough mastery of their native 
language was necessary for them, — a proposition which has 
gained steadily in favour from that time to this, and been applied 
to an increasingly large class of students. 

In so far as they represented the Latin school, the academies 
paid almost no attention whatever to English instruction. 2 Out- 



1 See above, p. 37. Franklin's plan was taken up at once by his 
fellow-citizens, and the Philadelphia Academy became, in course of time, 
the University of Pennsylvania, but not until the original idea had been 
radically altered. 

2 The early records of Phillips Academy (Andover), for instance, 
which have been recently examined for this purpose, show that only 
English grammar was taught there in 1820. The first catalogue, that of 
1840, mentions only " written translations." In 1874 there was one ex- 
ercise a week in elocution, composition, or written translation; in 1878, 
two terms (and in 1879 three terms) of English grammar and analysis. 
In 1880-1881 a few exercises in the study of English authors were given; 



THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 45 

side the curriculum there were frequently debating societies 

and literary clubs ; inside the curriculum there was little or 

nothing that bore on the study of the native tongue, „ „ ,. „ .. 
J ° ' English in tie 

except the practice of translation from the ancient Academies, 
languages into English. It is fair to say that, even under these 
circumstances, a good English education was often obtained. 
The interest of the community in literature, in the days of the 
Puritan renaissance, was such that the eager boy could be trusted 
voluntarily to study the great works of his own literature, and 
class-room instruction in Latin and Greek was carried on so 
carefully that the student was usually forced to translate Latin 
into thoroughly good English. The result of both influences 
was that outside the class-room he acquired some knowledge 
of literature and that inside the class room he often obtained a 
meagre but sufficient training in accurate writing. 

In so far as the academy was a school for the people, it showed 
a marked tendency to do away with the classical languages and 
to substitute mathematics, the sciences, the modern languages 
and English. English lagged somewhat behind the other sub- 
jects. The trouble lay not so much in the lack of desire for 
instruction as in the general feeling that there was no great body 
of instruction to give. After the pupils had mastered grammar, 
they wrote formal themes, they gave orations and declamations, 
they studied treatises on rhetoric and aesthetics like those of 
Blair, Kames, and Campbell, or their American imitators. But 
this meagre and formal course of study, ill-organized, artificial, 
and unintelligent, was all that the academies could offer, and it 
is due less to such instruction than to the earnestness and vigour 
of American communities that secondary students gained a 
mastery over the English language and English literature further 
than that given by the district school. 1 



in 1885, reading for the college requirements. In 1892, a group of Eng- 
lish studies was introduced, running through the entire course. These 
data apply to classical students only. 

1 R. G. Boone, in his History of Education in Indiana, Appleton, 1892, 
p. 51, speaking of the education given in the Western " seminaries " 



46 THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 

In the wonderful period of the New England transcendental 
movement, the days of a great intellectual awakening throughout 
The ffigli tne People at large, there appeared the most striking 
Schools. educational phenomenon of the last hundred years 

in America, the widespread and urgent demand for local, free, 
well-organized secondary instruction. Beginning in Massachu- 
setts and Connecticut, the two great sources of educational prog- 
ress as long as New England retained its pre-eminence, it found 
its way throughout the Union and resulted in every state in the 
establishment of high schools. Like the academy, the high school 
was the representative of two institutions, — the old Latin school 
and the new school for the people of which Franklin had dreamed. 
Wherever the high school represented the Latin school, — /'. e., in 
its classical course, — the study of English scarcely entered into 
the curriculum ; wherever it represented the school for the peo- 
ple— i. <?., in its so-called English or scientific course — English 
was a part of the curriculum ; but only to the degree described 
above in connection with the academies. 

Up to about 1876, then, there was scarcely to be found, in 

the United States, any definite, well-organized system of 

secondary instruction in the mother-tongue. We 
Summary. . ,. . „ 

were virtually m the same condition that England 

now is, and at least fifty years behind Germany. The Ameri- 
cans have always been a reading people, and there was a 
growing interest among scholars and laymen in the English 
language and in English literature. But only here and there 
had this penetrated into the secondary school system. 

Up to the nineteenth century the colleges had done practi- 
cally nothing in establishing a good system of instruction in 

English. The desire was absent, for such a policy 
The Colleges. * ■ k * 

would have been destructive of the current educa- 
tional system. In the American colleges, as in the English 



(academies) of about 1850, says : " Rhetoric, composition, debates, dec- 
lamation, the dictionary were much exalted, but were after all regarded 
rather as the common and efficient means at hand toward a practical 
preparation for civic and general public duties." 



THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 47 

universities at the present day, men gained a mastery over 
their mother-tongue by translation or in ways outside the 
curriculum, and no attempt was made to prescribe instruction 
in the history of the language, so far as it was known, or in the 
history of its literature. The only sign of the coming change 
was Jefferson's wish to give a prominent place to the study of 
Anglo-Saxon in the new University of Virginia, 1 which he had 
planned with a wisdom at least half a century in advance of his 
time. The elements that make up the modern curriculum in 
English, however, came one by one into existence. The first 
was a strong interest in declamation and oratory, perhaps best 
typified by the remarkable lectures given at Harvard University, 
in 1 806- 1 808, by John Quincy Adams. The second, instruc- 
tion in rhetoric and English composition, was by the middle of 
the century well established in several American colleges. The 
third element, English literature, and the fourth, English philol- 
ogy, 2 were not generally introduced, except in a meagre fashion, 
until about 1875. They were, however, then developed with 
great rapidity. 

Such was the condition of English instruction in the schools 
and colleges up to about 1876. It was then that a remarkable 
movement began, which had the result of making influence of 
the study of English pre-eminent in the more im- J^tSsecond- 
portant colleges and putting it in a distinguished ary Schools . 
place in the secondary schools. The impulse that led to this 
astonishing change in secondary instruction came partly from 
the colleges and partly from the secondary schools themselves. 
In 1873-1874 Harvard instituted an entrance examination 
in English, committing itself to a stand in favour of gram- 
matical and rhetorical accuracy in the use of English on the 



1 See Herbert B. Adams, Thomas Jefferson and the University of 
Virginia, in Circular of Information, No. I, U. S. Bureau of Education, 
1888, p. 92. 

2 See F. A. March, Method of Philological Study of the English 
Language, 1865, and " Recollections of Language Teaching," Publica- 
tions of Modern Language Association of America, 1893, "VIII. (new 
series, I.). 



48 THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 

part of students entering the college. 1 This policy was for 
years misunderstood by preparatory schools. An innovation, 
it was thought to spring from pedantry and a desire to burden 
the schools with new requirements. At that time the schools 
gave practically no instruction in English, and boys entering 
college were quite likely to write without grammatical or 
rhetorical correctness. As the years passed by, however, 
what the Harvard authorities desired became more clear, and 
fitting schools throughout the country began to prepare can- 
didates specifically for such examinations. It was then that 
Yale University introduced a new branch of English study by 
requiring, at entrance, beginning with 1894, a knowledge of 
the content of certain comparatively simple works of English 
literature. This requirement was apparently based upon the 
theory that much of the formal accuracy demanded by the 
other system was unnecessary or unattainable, that the great 
desideratum was that young students should know and appreciate 
English literature, and that in order to do this they must have 
a clear idea of what certain typical books meant. As in the 
former case, the main requirement was usually misinterpreted 
on the part of the fitting schools, and it was not for several 
years that a study of the content of certain English masterpieces 
became an essential part of the preparatory school curriculum 
in English. 

The second influence, less formal but more vital, came from 
the high schools themselves. While the attention of the pre- 
paratory schools was riveted on the movements of 
Movement , ,, , . , , r , -, 

in the High the colleges, which they were or necessity bound to 

follow closely, the high schools, not obliged to 
prepare for college, were freer to develop a more ideal system 
of national instruction. Teachers like Dr. Samuel Thurber of 
Boston, — to name one of many, — realized, as did men of the 
same rank and importance in France and Germany, the duty 



1 See " History of the Requirement in English for Admission to 
Harvard College," appendix to Twenty Years of School and College 
English, Harvard University, 1896. 



THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 49 

of the schools of the people in teaching the language of the 
people, and used every effort to put the study of English in the 
secondary schools on a firm basis. One of the clearest signs 
of the movement was the attention given to such matters in 
the journals of education. In Dr. Bacon's short-lived publica- 
tion, The Academy (1886-92), the subject of English received 
more attention than any other, and from 1890 on the same 
may perhaps be said of every similar school journal. The 
movement arising in the high schools was in part antagonistic 
to the movement coming from the colleges. The college 
authorities, who were rarely well informed regarding secondary 
education, as distinguished from preparatory education, were 
inclined to insist on a somewhat rigid course of study, leading 
directly up to the work which they themselves desired to give 
in the early college years. The high school authorities, on the 
other hand, were scarcely concerned about what was taught in 
college, simply desiring to give to their tens of thousands of 
pupils the wisest, most thorough course possible in English 
literature and English composition. As a result each party 
misunderstood the other, and it cannot be said, indeed, that 
even now the two points of view are wholly compatible. 

The results of this widespread movement for the more careful 
and systematic study of English in secondary schools are ex- 
ceedingly interesting. In the first place, separate Beginnings of 
colleges, seeing that their individual efforts to " raise Organization, 
the standard " of preparatory English were not having a suffi- 
ciently rapid effect, began to combine for the enforcement of 
the same entrance requirements. One of the first acts of the 
New England Commission of Colleges, founded in 1886, in re- 
sponse to an appeal from the New England Association of Col- 
leges and Preparatory Schools, was to stimulate and organize 
preparatory instruction in English by agreeing on a uniform list 
of books 1 from which should be chosen the subjects given out 
for English essays at the entrance examinations in all the New 



1 Beginning with 1889. See the Reports of the Commission 

4 



50 THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 

England colleges. The books were often badly selected, and 
the entrance requirements at the colleges concerned were often 
widely different in spirit or in letter, but this arrangement was a 
first step toward the formal organization of preparatory English, 
and, with all its vices, had the great virtue of serving as a defi- 
nite requirement, on which all colleges belonging to the Com- 
mission were bound in general to agree, and on which other 
colleges throughout the country might easily agree for the sake 
of convenience. A second step was taken in 1893, when, at 
the instance of the Association of the Colleges and Preparatory 
Schools of the Middle States and Maryland, a committee was 
appointed, consisting partly of college instructors and partly of 
preparatory school instructors, to arrange uniform entrance re- 
quirements in English for colleges in the territory indicated. 
The committee wisely foresaw that it could act only as a dis- 
turbing element if it did not proceed in harmony with the New 
England Commission of Colleges, the New England Association 
of Colleges and Preparatory Schools, and all existing organiza- 
tions of the latter sort. The result was that the chief colleges 
and schools throughout the country voluntarily agreed, through 
their representatives in these organizations, on a new system of 
entrance requirements, involving, first, the older or Harvard 
scheme, which demanded only skill in composition and rhetor- 
ical accuracy ; second, the Yale scheme, which threw the em- 
phasis on a knowledge of elementary facts concerning English 
literature ; and, third, a list of English classics which should 
serve as a basis for examination on each of the parts mentioned. 1 
Although open to grave objections, this arrangement was ob- 
viously a great step in advance. The colleges, with only a few 
exceptions, had at last, with the help of the preparatory schools, 
agreed on a uniform entrance requirement. 

A second group of results was that obtained wholly or largely 
through the efforts of the schools themselves. The National 



1 A Summary of the Proceedings of the Meetings of the Conference on 
Uniform Entrance Requirements in English, 1894- 1899. 



THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 5 1 

Educational Association had long shown a marked interest in 
the teaching of English, and the publication, in 1 894, of the 
Report of the National Committee of Ten on Second- progress in 
ary Schools gave a new basis to instruction in Eng- Organization. 
lish. The committee dealing with English consisted partly of 
secondary school teachers, both from high schools and prepara- 
tory schools, and partly of college professors of English, and 
their task was to construct a curriculum in English that should 
serve the interests of general education, for the benefit of the 
many, and not merely that of the few who go to colleges. Their 
admirable report was the first attempt, in England or America, 
to systematize secondary instruction in English. The principal 
points in which it was noteworthy are as follows : (1) It made 
of English instruction in the secondary schools a complete 
organism. Through it the schools came to realize for the first 
time that instruction in English means, not a group of discon- 
nected studies in grammar, rhetoric, English literature, and elo- 
cution, but one constant current, as it were, of work, running 
throughout the whole period of instruction. (2) The committee 
was convinced that secondary education in English can be prop- 
erly systematized only when it is considered in direct con- 
nection with elementary instruction in the same subject. It 
proceeded, therefore, to lay down certain principles and plans 
for the teaching of English from the earliest grades of the ele- 
mentary schools through the highest classes in the high schools. 
Other parts of the same inquiry have been taken up in greater 
detail by the Committee of Fifteen on Elementary Education 
(1895), whose duty it was to recommend a systematic course in 
English for the elementary schools, and by the Committee on 
College Entrance Requirements (1899), whose aim was to 
formulate a course of study leading towards the college require- 
ments. These three reports have had two marked results: 
(1). they have aroused great interest throughout the country in 
the subject of a graded course of English instruction, and (2) 
they have helped to formulate definite principles on which in- 
struction in English may be based. The ideals pursued are still 



52 THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 

various, but the confusion is less great than before, and it is 
plain that light is breaking through the darkness. It will not 
be many years before the whole subject can be taken up from a 
broader and more philosophic point of view, the different theo- 
ries harmonized, the different aims unified, and an ideal course 
of study, thoroughly adapted to American needs, built up 
throughout the country. 

It will be noticed that in the United States as much time is given 
to instruction in the mother-tongue as in the other countries, 1 

and that, roughly speaking, the field covered is as 
of instruction great. It may, on the whole, be believed that in the 

best American schools the field is covered also as 
thoroughly. In short, the great difference between the situa- 
tion in America and that in other countries lies not in the fact 
that the best schools in America do not do such good work in 
the mother- tongue as that done in other countries, but that in 
America there is in this, as in other subjects, a wide difference 
between the instruction given in the best schools and that given 
in other schools. 

IV. The General Theory of Instruction in the 
Mother-Tongue 

It will be clear that the time has now come for a careful 
study, in America and England, of all that pertains to element- 
The Purpose arv an< ^ secondary instruction in English. In the 
of this Book. £ rst pi acCj t ne su bject is a comparatively new one 
and needs further investigation. Sound systems for the teach- 
ing of any mother-tongue have only recently been developed, 
and England has in this respect lagged far behind its European 
sisters. It is necessary for our American schools to look care- 
fully to their own needs, and to develop their own system, turn- 
ing for help to the models furnished by French and German 
rather than by English schools. In the second place, it is plain 



1 See J. E. Russell, German Higher Schools, Chapter XII., and F. E. 
Bolton, Secondary School System of Germany ', 264. 



THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 53 

that the present status of instruction in English is only partly 
satisfactory. The influences which have been indicated above 
have, to some extent, brought about a superficial organization of 
the whole field, but the condition is at best one of confusion 
and uncertainty. In the third place, the subject is worthy of 
the most careful study on account of its value to the public and 
to the individual. To the general public it is important because 
the curricula of our public schools are now, to a large extent, 
either badly arranged or insufficient, so far as English is con- 
cerned. To the individual it is important because he may be 
enabled, by understanding the general theory of education in the 
mother-tongue, to counteract the influences which have been 
exerted upon him by an ill-balanced, incomplete, or falsely 
based system. The aim of this book is the statement and dis- 
cussion of the whole group of theories, general and particular, 
regarding the teaching of English in the elementary and second- 
ary schools. The object of the authors has been in every case 
to state the principal existing theories and to discuss them, with 
a view to determining which, in whole or in part, are more 
worthy of acceptance. It is their earnest desire, however, that 
their own conclusion in these matters be not accepted, if at all, 
without careful thought. 

We have seen the rise of the study of the vernacular in the 
chief European nations ; we have also seen the various steps by 
which the study of English has risen in America to a command- 
ing importance. It is now necessary to supplement this histori- 
cal study with a brief consideration of the general reasons why a 
study of the vernacular is of real importance to the community, 
and with an examination of the general theory of such study. 

It is obviously for the welfare of the nation that all the com- 
munities which form it should realize clearly their mutual rela- 
tions. It is equally obvious that the attainment of i mportance 
this national consciousness must be, to a very great ye^acula 
degree, dependent upon the thorough and general to a Nation. 
understanding of a common tongue. Nations in which the 
component communities speak and read no common tongue are 



54 THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 

nations only in name, as may be seen in China, where whole 

provinces use languages largely unintelligible to the inhabitants 

of other provinces, and where the literary language of all is a 

tongue which requires many years for its mastery. To speak 

a dialect of Chinese is the birthright of every Chinese child ; but 

to read and write the literary language takes in itself at least 

ten years. That is to say, the Chinese pupil at the end of ten 

years is not, in point of linguistic progress, beyond the American 

child who has just learned to read and write the characters 

of the English language. The common tongue, inasmuch as 

it is the basis of a common literature, is indispensable to 

the establishment of national ideals and of national systems of 

thought. 

To the individual the cultivation of the vernacular is also of 

great importance. It is, in the first place, his instrument 

T . „ in all his communication with others : it is, in the 

Importance ' ' 

t°tiie second place, the instrument by which his aesthetic 

Individual. l ' ... 

needs are chiefly served ; it is, in the third place, 

the means by which he arrives at intellectual consciousness. 

Modern psychologists teach us that a considerable part of our 

existence is filled with cerebral action that is not translated into 

words. During sleep, and indeed in many of our waking 

moments, the stream of consciousness flows on without verbal 

expression. On the other hand, it is clear that when the mind 

is thoroughly awake, when questions are to be decided and 

thought must be definite, the skilful use of language, even in 

the mind's relations with itself, is almost an absolute necessity. 

The intellectual life depends to a considerable degree upon the 

mastery of words, without which any connected chain of 

reasoning is almost wholly impossible. To the individual, 

therefore, the ability to utilize language as an instrument for 

his conscious rule over himself is his distinguishing mark 

as a man, the token that marks him off from the child or 

the savage. 

Granting the need of a thorough mastery of the native tongue 

on the part of an educated man or woman, we now pass to the 



THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 55 

several parts of 'which such mastery consists. It is clear that 
the mastery of one's mother-tongue depends upon three cardinal 
points: (i) the ability of the individual to under- in what the 
stand the thoughts of others, whether spoken or Signage* 
written : (2) his ability to express his own thoughts Consists - 
through spoken or written words ; (3) his ability to gain aesthetic 
pleasure through his native literature. These general points we 
may now proceed to analyze. 

The individual must obviously be able to articulate clearly all 
English sounds (independently of their meaning) in accordance 
with the general national custom. In other words, 
the infant must learn to make the sounds which are * 
agreed on by its elders as conventional signs for the expression 
of thought. Such training is largely the work of the mother and 
of the home, but it enters also partly into school life, and is 
the necessary step on which all later progress in oral composi- 
tion must be based. Its broader aspect is too often neglected. 
The child must be able not merely to utter sounds roughly and 
approximately, but to pronounce them accurately and by the 
proper use of the vocal mechanism. The elementary teacher 
has few higher duties than that of inculcating, by example and 
precept, a clear pronunciation of English vowels and consonants. 
It is by such training that unpleasant dialectic peculiarities — 
e. g., the nasal twang of the New Englander — can be destroyed. 1 



1 While, however, it is the duty of the teacher to tone down harsh 
and obtrusive dialectal peculiarities in the speech of his pupils, it is not 
his duty wholly to eliminate such peculiarities. He may safely lessen the 
difference between one pupil's speech and another's, but he should be- 
ware of attempting to reduce the speech of all to a dead level of uni- 
formity. To do so would be to arrest the normal processes of language 
growth. The speech of no country is strictly homogeneous. Differences 
in climate, in language-inheritance, in character, in social conditions, in 
modes of thought and feeling, prevail in different geographical sections, 
and these differences will find expression in corresponding differences 
of pronunciation, of intonation, even of vocabulary and sentence-structure. 
The Southern child, by the time he has reached the secondary school, 
has acquired beyond recall the Southern for u (before r), the Southern 
d for th, the Southern w for wh, and the other peculiarities of speech 



$6 THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 

A faulty pronunciation may of course be due, in large measure, 
to defective organs of speech, or to defective nervous control of 



which the Northerner is accustomed to attribute (mistakenly) to the 
influence of the negro dialect. The middle-Westerner at the same age 
has acquired the glottal catch before initial vowels and the short a in 
past and glass ; the Hoosier has acquired the aw-sound in dog and. fog; 
the New Englander has acquired the flattened a in father, the final r in 
idea-r and Isaiah-r, and the shortened o in hot. Even if at the age of 
eight or ten the pupil be transplanted to another part of the country, as 
from Alabama to New York, he will all his life long exhibit in his speech 
— at least in moments of excitement and spontaneous utterance — some 
traces of this early acquired pronunciation. 

The retention of some part of his native dialect is not, however, to be 
regarded by the teacher as an unmixed evil. Why should it be ? The 
spoken language is richer, more musical, more interesting for these 
differences, which for educated people diminish in no degree the intel- 
ligibility of the speech. The time will come when only the pedantic and the 
bookish teacher will insist that every pupil in the school shall pronounce 
glass and past and whole according to some preferred authority. Indeed, 
the growing liberality of editors of dictionaries seems likely soon to give 
warrant for any pronunciation which prevails among educated people in 
any given section of the United States. 

To take this attitude toward the teaching of pronunciation is not, how- 
ever, to throw the doors open to arbitrary or meaningless variations from 
the common language. It is simply to recognize the fact that the com- 
mon language, at every stage of its progress, is the result of the incessant 
competition of sectional and individual differences in speech-habits. 
This competition cannot be prevented either by legislation or by instruc- 
tion, and any serious and concerted attempt to prevent it by rigorous 
discipline in the schools is certain to result in bodkishness and affecta- 
tion. An insistence upon clear and accurate enunciation is quite com- 
patible with toleration of minor differences in the position of the vocal 
organs of pupils from different parts of the country. 

When, however, the peculiarities of speech observable in the pupils 
are the result of foreign influences, as, for example, where the pupils 
come from homes in which the parents speak only Polish, or Swedish, or 
Pennsylvania German, the situation is radically different, and the duty 
of the teacher is different. Such influences are to be regarded as abnor- 
mal and should be resisted. No doubt even these influences will have 
their effect in the long run, and in spite of all that can be done will 
mould to some extent the future pronunciation of the English language 
in America. But at present they are extra-national. They cannot be 
recognized as legitimate factors in the shaping of the common lan- 
guage. [F. N. S.] 



THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE S7 

these organs. 1 Such cases can often be cured under enlightened 
medical advice, and a great many cases that might seem at 
first to require medical treatment could be at least greatly re- 
lieved if elementary teachers were thoroughly well trained in 
the use of the voice, and had a sound knowledge of the 
mechanism by which the voice is produced. 

Correspondingly, the individual must be able to understand 
the words uttered by others. That is to say, his ear must 

reproduce for him the utterances of the vocal organs 

. Hearing, 

of others. Skill in this respect is likewise almost 

entirely secured under home influences. It may be well, how- 
ever, to call attention to the fact that many cases of stupidity 
among pupils, particularly with regard to their English studies, 
are due to peculiarities of hearing, and that the duty of the 
elementary teacher is always to make sure that the child really 
hears completely and accurately. If it does not, the causes 
should be investigated and the child placed, if necessary, under 
medical treatment. 2 

The points spoken of above are largely secured by the general 
training obtained through the ordinary experiences of life. If 
one never went to school at all, he would by imitation, if pro- 
vided by nature with good organs of hearing and of speech, 
learn to give a definite meaning to the sounds uttered by others 
and to make them for himself. The two points which follow, 
however, are different in this respect, and are more especially 
subjects of school instruction. 

The individual must learn to write a clear hand. The impor- 
tance of penmanship, or of the ability to form the symbols re- 
quired by convention for the expression of thought, -writing ^^ 
can scarcely be exaggerated. Such knowledge is Reading: 
a very elementary step in education, but it is none the less of 
the utmost importance, and if the pupil be not well grounded in 
this respect, as is too frequently the case, his further instruction 



1 S. H. Rowe, The Physical Nature of the Child, 1899, Chapter VI. 

2 Rowe, Chapter III. 



58 THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 

will be constantly impeded. The individual must also be able 
to recognize by sight the symbols by which society has agreed 
to express its thought; in other words, he must learn to read. 
It is the duty and the pleasure of the modern teacher to see that 
he learns to read rapidly, without, as was the case for many 
centuries, wasting a considerable degree of time and effort. 

The subjects just mentioned are usually associated with school 
instruction. They may, however, be learned at home, and fre- 
quently are learned there. When he understands these two 
arts, the young citizen has mastered all the essentials of educa- 
tion. He has in his possession the two most precious elements 
of civilization, which are thus handed down from one generation 
to another. All the rest of his English education he can, if 
necessary, derive of his own accord from books or from life, as 
many great men have been forced to do. The training of the 
schools can, however, simplify the process greatly and add to its 
richness and thoroughness. In the remaining subjects school 
instruction plays an increasingly important part. 

The individual must have the power of effective speech. It 
should be remembered that language is primarily a matter of the 
Effective voice and of the ear, not of the hand and of the eye. 
Speech. The living language is the spoken language. The 

written language is merely a conventional form of the spoken lan- 
guage. The more important aim of education in the mother- 
tongue must, therefore, always be the development of power over 
the spoken language rather than over the written language. In 
this instruction there are two important elements, both too fre- 
quently neglected by high schools and elementary schools. These 
subjects are : elocution and practice in public speaking. By elo- 
cution we mean knowledge of, and practice in, the principles of 
voice production. The human voice is a mechanism for utter- 
ing sounds, — a mechanism whose working is dependent upon 
simple mechanical laws. The child can understand the chief of 
these, and all students can be practised in such attitudes of the 
body, such habits of breathing, such uses of the muscles of the 
throat, as will enable them to speak with effectiveness and ease. 



THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 59 

The second point is one in which practice rather than theory is 
involved. No child or man has a proper mastery over his native 
language who is unduly impeded by nervous fear from utter- 
ing his thoughts in the presence of others, whether they be few 
or many. The child can be encouraged to speak frankly and 
freely in the recitation room, at proper times, with quiet self- 
possession. The older student can be helped by having prac- 
tice, at regular intervals, in the speaking of the compositions of 
others or of his own work, in the presence of small or large 
groups of his companions. The result of intelligent direction 
in these respects will be that, on leaving the high school, 
every boy and girl will have learned self-control under these 
circumstances, and will thus be able the more successfully 
to meet the necessary demands of business, professional, or 
social life. 

The individual must also have the power of effective written 
expression. Like the similar faculty just treated, this depends 

to a great extent upon the development of the 

r * T 11 Effective 

powers of reason. No person, old or young, can Written 

, ■ -, r m - i i i • ■, Expression, 

express himself enectively by oral or written words 

unless his thought be worth expressing. The object of the 
school is partly to help each individual to be conscious of his 
own important ideas, and partly so to train him that when 
these ideas are already formed they can be properly expressed. 
The whole subject of effective written expression is even more 
largely composite than that of oral expression. In vocal expres- 
sion there are mechanical laws to which the student's attention 
can be called and in which he can be trained. In written ex- 
pression there are no mechanical laws except those involved in 
penmanship. Effective written expression is, therefore, mainly 
a matter of intellectual skill and knowledge, and may be regarded 
as depending upon the two subjects stated below. 

The individual must have a clear understanding of the words 
which make up the national vocabulary. He must know their 
use and meaning ; that is to say, he must realize the associations 
connected, in the minds of people at large, with the English 



60 THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 

vocabulary. In order to accomplish this task thoroughly, in 
order to be the master and not the slave of words, he must 
Knowledge understand, to some extent, their derivation, and 
National ^ s mv °l ves some knowledge of Old English and 

Vocabulary. Latin ; he must be familiar with their use in literature ; 
he must realize the distinctions between different words of much 
the same meaning ; and he must, last of all, realize the differ- 
ence existing in association between dialectic or vulgar expres- 
sions, technically so called, and expressions used in literature. 
The process is a long one, and must continue while education 
and life last, but it may be well begun in the elementary schools, 
and the necessary foundations may be" laid in the high school, so 
that the young man on leaving the high school may be independ- 
ent, if necessary, of further formal instruction in this regard. 

It is also obvious that the student should be thoroughly ac- 
quainted, not only with the vocabulary, but with the grammar 
Grammar °^ ms nat; i ve language, i. e., with the laws that govern 
and Rhetoric, inflection and syntax. It is perhaps not so obvious 
that this part of the student's training should be extended to 
cover, first, the larger laws which govern the structure of sen- 
tences, paragraphs, and whole compositions, and which consti- 
tute rhetoric, and, second, the less easily defined but no less 
active principles which govern the general growth of the lan- 
guage. Little positive instruction can be given on this latter 
point, for grammarians and philologists are only beginning to con- 
sider it. It is becoming increasingly clear, however, not only 
that language is in a continual state of flux, — word after word, 
phrase after phrase growing antiquated or dialectic, and other 
locutions taking their places, — but that this process of decay and 
growth is to a large extent the result of a national striving 
towards an unconscious ideal. 1 It is for the welfare of us all 
that every boy and girl, so far as possible, should realize what 
the characteristics of our common speech are, and what its ten- 



1 See M. Breal, Semantics: Studies in the Science of Meaning, Holt, 
1900, p. 7. 



THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 6l 

dencies are, for it is not by the genius, the critic, the scholar, or 
the man of letters alone that language is formed, but by the 
combined practice of all who use it. 

All the preceding portions of the student's instruction may 
be acquired, it should be noticed, independently of the study 
of literature. It is not meant, of course, that they can be best 
secured without a study of literature, but it is only just to say 
that such branches of linguistic instruction depend, theoretically 
at least, upon the spoken language rather than the written. 
Under proper instruction, it is wholly possible for a student to 
be well grounded in drawing or painting without a knowledge 
of the great masterpieces of his art. He may even, to some 
extent, teach himself the rudiments of the art, simply by observ- 
ing the physical forms which he wishes to delineate, and com- 
paring his product with the original. He can certainly be taught 
with success by an instructor who uses no other model than 
nature itself, but who asks the pupil to observe and then to draw, 
and then shows him how his product differs from the original. 
The same process may be carried on with those portions of lin- 
guistic instruction which we know as reading, writing, grammar, 
and rhetoric. The following parts of the student's instruction, on 
the contrary, are essentially concerned with the knowledge and 
appreciation of the great masterpieces of his own literature. 

The first of these new branches of instruction is the aesthetic 
appreciation of good literature. Such appreciation is not al- 
ways instinctive on the part of the young, — indeed, 

3 Appreciation 

it may be said to be very rarely instinctive. The of Good 

average boy or girl, in the midst of modern civili- 
zation, finds so much outside of literature to occupy his mind, 
and the influence on him of the practical life surrounding him, 
of business, of science, of the whole world of fact, is so great as 
often to deaden in him even such instinctive appreciation as 
he may have for the apparently unreal and fantastic world of 
literature. The appreciation of literature is, of course, not in- 
dispensable to a useful and noble life, as has been shown by 
many instances. It invariably brings/however, an added joy to 



62 THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 

life, and is therefore, though not an indispensable part of edu- 
cation, at least an important one. 

Besides learning to appreciate good literature, it is important 
that the young student should be brought into familiar contact 

with the great masterpieces of his native literature, 
with Master- Appreciation itself might perhaps be taught him 

through the current literature of his day, if not 
through the great literature of his day, rather than through the 
great literature of preceding epochs, just as an appreciation of 
painting, sculpture, or architecture might be given him through 
the contemporary products of those arts rather than through the 
greatest products of preceding ages- His appreciation of lit- 
erature, however, will to a large extent be solidly based only 
in proportion as it is founded on the masterpieces of several 
periods of the native literature. 

Last, it is important that the student should have a clear 
realization of the elements of his native literature that are most 

characteristically national or racial, in order that his 
National ideals individual ideals of conduct may become consonant 

with the more permanent and noble aims of hu- 
manity, and of the special division of humanity to which he 
belongs by inheritance or by education. 

Such is the general theory of instruction in a native language. 
It has been so phrased as to apply to any modern language, 
and may in general be said to represent the body of instruction 
in the mother-tongue given by all nations that are paying atten- 
tion to such matters. Certain special points, however, must be 
mentioned in which the English language, or the English 
language as spoken in America, is peculiar, and which there- 
fore tend to differentiate British or American instruction in 
English from that given by other important nations in their 
respective languages. 

(i) The orthography of English, like that of French, is com- 
plicated. It is not so intricate a system as ; that employed by 
the Chinese, but it is much more intricate than that of German, 



THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 63 

Italian, or Spanish. That is to say, the child must spend a 
longer time in learning the irregular and anomalous ways of 
spelling English words than he would in learning the ew^ 
more regular ways of spelling German or Italian Orthography. 
words. In this respect, relief may, after many years, be se- 
cured, if the influence of the government and of all important 
educational bodies be directed toward the simplifying and reg- 
ularizing of present conventions as to spelling. 1 Elementary 
teachers may also save the loss of valuable time on the part 
of the student by devising clever means for presenting the 
subject of spelling in such a way that its difficulties will be 
minimized. 

(2) The point mentioned above is the only point in which 
the English language is more difficult than other important 

modern languages. It is singularly free from in- 

n • i . .> 1 • i • 1 English not 

nectional or syntactical irregularity, and presents a Difficult 

therefore few difficulties for the native. A child 
of ten may speak it with perfect correctness, so far as all points 
of inflection or syntax go. There are no puzzling questions of 
agreement, as in French, which even the well-educated native 
may strive in vain to make instinctive, and no intricate gram- 
matical constructions as in German. 

It should also be noticed that, in American schools, instruction 
in English is not obliged to fight against the force of local dia- 
lects. There are in various parts of the United FewDialectic 
States certain local peculiarities in pronunciation, Differei *ces. 
in vocabulary, and occasionally in syntax ; but taken altogether 
they amount to little, and the difficulties they occasion are not 
for a moment comparable to the difficulties which the British 
rural school may encounter in teaching English to pupils whose 
native speech is a peculiar and dialectic form of English. These 
difficulties are even greater in France, Germany, and Italy, 
where a considerable part of the instruction in the native 



1 See Brander Matthews, Parts of Speech, Scribner's, 1901, Chapters 
XII. and XIII. 



64 THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 

tongue must, in isolated districts, be given to the uprooting 
of the native dialect and the implanting of the standard or 
national usage. 

There is one other modification in the system of instruction 
in the native tongue which must be taken into account in the 
Children of United States. Immigration has been so rapid and 
immigrants. SQ j Qng cont i nue d t ] iat t h e TJmted States must in 

its public elementary schools educate large numbers of children 
to whom English is a foreign or a newly acquired language. 
This is especially the case in some country districts, where 
local conditions have occasioned the influx of a large body 
of foreign immigrants, and in some large city schools, where 
the children are often not of one but of several races and 
nations. 

It must be borne in mind that schools are not the only means 
by which the young are trained in the understanding of their 
native language and literature. We must take into account 
several other factors, all of which tend to increase or to diminish 
the effectiveness of work done by the schools, and which there- 
fore the teacher must keep carefully in mind, availing himself of 
the advantages they offer as the skilful seaman avails himself of 
favourable tides or currents. 

(i) Of these the influence extended by the family is the 
most important. A child born of educated and refined parents, 
Influence of wn0 ^ as ^ een accus tomed to hearing the language 
the Family, spoken correctly and with good taste, and who 
has been familiar from infancy with good literature, must 
of necessity need instruction in the native language far less 
than a child from a family of a wholly different kind. Indeed, 
it might be said 'that a child from an educated family would 
scarcely need elementary instruction in such matters at all, 
were it not that, particularly in the United States, and at the 
present time, even educated fathers and mothers often pay 
little or no attention to the language or reading of their 
children. 



THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 65 

(2) The influence of the community is also important. As 
we have seen, the old-fashioned New England common school 
was scarcely, in itself, a medium of good instruction, 

but the community in which it existed was so thor- of the 

Community. 
oughly alive, and so thoroughly devoted to intellect- 
ual matters, that any intelligent person growing up in the midst 
of it could scarcely avoid having his ambition aroused and his 
linguistic powers trained and developed. 

(3) Religious exercises, of whatever sect, when carried on in 
the native language, have always been a powerful factor in lin- 
guistic instruction. The Church of England, and influence of 
other churches making use of old forms of service, t^e Church. 
may influence youth deeply by the reiteration of charming groups 
of words, which slowly impress themselves upon the memory. 
Such other sects as make use only to a slight degree of set forms 
of worship are perhaps even more valuable in such instruction, 
when the attention of the young is trained by listening to elo- 
quent or logical speakers. Indeed, far more was done for the 
knowledge of the native tongue in Scotland and in New England 
in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries by effective preach- 
ing than by effective teaching. 

(4) The influence of the press is sometimes scarcely less 
effective, and, up to recent times, it has largely been exerted 
for good. The more widely circulated papers of the country, 
until within a few years, have exhibited a high degree jj^^q^q f 
of dignity and thoughtfulness in all matters of ex- the Press, 
pression. Of late, however, various circumstances have led to a 
total change of manner on the part of most of the great news- 
papers, and at the present day it is to be feared that the 
influence of the press is in this respect often a bad one. The 
other widely distributed forms of the periodical press, such as 
the monthly magazines, have a better influence, though it is to 
be doubted whether we are wise in allowing secondary school 
students to spend much time in the perusal of current litera- 
ture, in which somewhat trivial fiction is predominant. 

(5) The influence of the library must not be omitted. Dur- 

5 



66 THE STUDY OF THE MOTHER-TONGUE 

ing the last half of the nineteenth century one of the most notable 

features of education in the United States has been the growth 

throughout the country of local libraries, which 

have been widely used by the citizens at large, and the Public 

particularly by the young. In this respect we differ 

to a marked degree from other nations, and the difference must 

be counted in our favour. 



CHAPTER II 

ENGLISH IN ELEMENTAEY EDUCATION 

GENERAL BIBLIOGRAPHY 

For the historical views, see 
Karl Kehr. Geschichte des Lese-Unterrichts in der Volksschule. 

Gotha. 1889. 
Feehner. Geschichte des Volksschul-Lesebuches. Gotha. 1889. 
Paul Leicester Ford. The New England Primer. New York. 1897. 

F. F. Feeder. The Historical Development of the School Reader. 
New York. 1900. 

Matthew Arnold. Reports on Elementary Schools. London and New 

York. 1889. 
Reports of the United States Bureau of Education. 

For the discussion of the general subject of language teaching, see 

G. Stanley Hall. How to Teach Reading. Boston and New York. 
18S6. 

S. S. Laurie. Language and Linguistic Method. Edinburgh. 1893. 

J. M. Fice. The Public School System of the United States. New 

York. 1893. 
C. Lloyd Morgan. Psychology for Teachers. London. 1894. 
W. T. Harris, in Report of the Committee of Fifteen. New York. 

1895- 
B. A. Hinsdale. Teaching the Language- Arts. New York. 1896. 
Karl Kehr. Praxis in der Volksschule. Gotha. 1897. 
New York Teachers' Monographs. Vol. I. No. 3, Vol. III. No. 3, and 

Vol. IV. No. 3. 
Sarah Louise Arnold. Reading, How to Teach It. Boston. 1899. 
Fercival Chubb. The Teaching of English. New York. 1902. 
Files of The Academy, The Educational Review, The School 

Review, The Atlantic Monthly, The Forum, and other journals, 

especially since 1892. 

For special discussion of the teaching of literature, see 
John Morley. On the Study of Literature. London. 1887. 
J. W. Hales. Introduction to Longer English Poems. London. 1889. 
Matthew Arnold. Literature and Science, in Discourses in America. 

New York. 1889. 



68 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION . 

Hudson's Introductions to Hamlet, The Merchant of Venice, and As 
You Like it. Ginn & Co. 

H. C. Bowen. English Literature Teaching in Schools. London. 1891. 

Hiram Corson. Aims of Literary Study. New York. 1895. 

Edward Dowden. On the Study of Literature, in New Studies in Litera- 
ture. London. 1895. 

Thomas It. Price. Language and Literature. Educational Review. 
Vol. XL January, 1896. 

Arlo Bates. Talks on the Study of Literature. Boston. 1897. 

C. A. McMurry. Special Method in Literature and History. Bloom- 
ington (111.). 1900. 

For the treatment of grammar, see 
Laurie, Hinsdale, and Report of the Committee of Fifteen, cited above. 
Goold Brown's Grammar of Grammars. Second edition. London and 

New York.- 1857. 
W. D. Whitney. Essentials of English Grammar. Boston and New 

York. 1884. 
G. R. Carpenter. Principles of English Grammar. New York. 1898. 
Earle. English Grammar. London and New York. 1898. 
Mark H. Liddell. English Historical Grammar. Atlantic Monthly. 

Vol. LXXXII. July, 1898. 
H. G. Buehler. A Modern English Grammar. New York. 1900. 
Henry Sweet. A New English Grammar. Clarendon Press. 1898 

and 1900. 
F. A. Barbour. The Teaching of English Grammar. Boston and New 

York. 1 901. 
G.J. Smith (Editor). Longmans' English Grammar. New York. 1902. 

I. General Conditions 

The necessity of teaching the vernacular in the elementary 
schools is universally accepted. But in respect of the relative 
Present importance assigned to it, the material through which 

in^Ush^ it should be presented, and the aim and methods 
Teaching. determining the instruction, it has had, like other 
well-established subjects, to justify its place. During the last 
century all phases of the study of the mother-tongue have been 
seriously discussed. The result is a considerable, and probably 
a permanent, revolution in the content and methods of study. 
A cursory view of present conditions and an estimate of the place 
of English in the elementary school as determined by modern 
conditions will now be attempted. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 69 

In those schools which best exemplify the recent develop- 
ment of elementary education, no feature is more interesting or 
more significant than the increase in the number 
of things in the curriculum. A typical modern the Modern 
school contains many subjects unthought of in the 
instruction given a few decades ago. At that time the ability 
to read the school readers, — about six in number for the entire 
course ; a very rudimentary outline of the history of the United 
States, dealing with external, unrelated, and semi-traditional 
facts ; and the ability to do "sums " in arithmetic, partly as a 
means of mental discipline and partly as an equipment for 
practical business needs, made up the whole of the elementary 
course. If the pupil had proclivities towards hand- work, he 
whittled his desk or made gimcracks as a distraction from his 
school tasks ; if he liked to draw, he caricatured his teacher 
and ran the risk of the ferule ; if he had interests in natural 
history, these interests came into the school-room in the shape 
of animals illegally introduced. What are now recognized as 
interests and capacities to be developed, were then likely to be 
regarded as outcroppings of original sin. We have changed all 
that. We want the boy to read a considerable amount of 
good literature, and to appreciate it. We want him to write 
with a fair degree of ease and accuracy, and to enjoy writing. 
We want him to know the history of his country, its constitu- 
tional growth, something of the historical causes at work in the 
past and in the present, and something of the types of social 
ideas and civilization that have preceded our own. We want 
him to do a little drawing, painting, and modelling, and to gain 
some real appreciation of art. We want him to establish a 
good co-ordination between hand and brain, and so we give 
him the tools of the artist and the artisan, and require him to 
handle them better than his fathers. We want him to get 
mathematical concepts, and so to his arithmetic we add alge- 
bra and geometry. We want him to know something of the 
laws of animate and inanimate nature, and we give him 
physics and biology. We want him, sometimes, to lay the 



70 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

foundations of a cosmopolitan culture, and we give him French 
or German. We want him to have something of the physical 
perfection of the Greek youth, and we give him gymnastics and 
field-sports. Most of these things we ask of him before he is 
fifteen. 1 

The remarkable thing is to see how much of all this we are 
getting without injury and with much of benefit and happiness 
to the pupil. There are, of course, many lamentable failures, — . 
failures chargeable to dulness of the pupils ; to inexpertness, 
ignorance, or lack of personal power in the teacher ; to bad 
conditions in home and school, for which the community at 
large is responsible ; to programs over-crowded, ill-co-ordinated 
or ill-adjusted to the needs of the school. Failures due to any 
or to all of these causes do undoubtedly still occur. So long 
as human wisdom and skill remain imperfect, so long as failure 
and success are relative terms and ideal results are understood 
to mean results not usually attained, so long will failure some- 
times attend the best efforts. But none the less, though com- 
parisons between past and present are rendered difficult and 
uncertain by incomplete data, it seems safe to say that the old 
studies are pursued as well or better than before, and these new 
things added thereunto. Many more things are learned in the 
modern school. They are learned with much less of labour and 
pain and tears. The dull boy and the idle probably leave the 
grammar school now with a better training than did the higher 
type of boy a generation ago ; and the capable boy who works 
under a good teacher is incomparably better taught than were 
his parents. And we have probably not yet found the limit of 
children's capacity to absorb and to do. 

This fulness of the modern school program is not only an indi- 
cation of the many-sidedness of modern life, but a proof of the 
closer relationship between the school and the life of the com- 
munity. Indeed, one hears on all sides the avowed intention to 
make the elementary school, whether it give the first or the last 



1 See Paul Hanus, "Our Chaotic Education," Forum, April, 1902. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 71 

instruction the pupils receive, a direct preparation for life in as 

full measure as possible. The school thus becomes not merely 

a reflection of the richness of modern life, but an expression of 

a spirit that is at once social and democratic. Another equally 

obvious feature of the present conditions is the disappearance 

of the distinctly academic view of education. It is no longer 

an evidence of " gentility" to know things. Art, literature, and 

history are not felt to be the exclusive property of the fortunately 

born, but rather the inheritance of all who are able to acquire 

them. Emerson's predicted ideal of the American scholar is 

reaching fulfilment in the universities, and is recognized as the 

true ideal in the lower schools. 

This democratic ideal in elementary education is at once the 

cause and the explanation of one of its dominant characteristics. 

It has been truly said that " Spontaneity is the key- T 

J ir j j inequalities. 

note of education in the United States. Its varied Democratic 

ideals, 
form, its uneven progress, its lack of symmetry, 

its practical effectiveness, are all due to the fact that it has sprung, 
unbidden and unforced, from the needs and aspirations of the 
people. Local preference and individual initiative have been rul- 
ing forces." * Nowhere is the unevenness due to the conditions, 
needs, and aspirations of the people greater or more obvious 
than in the elementary schools. They include the children of 
all grades of society ; and although they represent democratic 
ideals, and recognize, in theory at least, no difference between 
the destination of the son of the day labourer and the son of the 
"gentleman born," although the assumption in their courses of 
study is that both have the same destination and like ability, 
yet out of this very uniformity of theory spring the greatest 
diversities in practice. The children of unintelligent immigrants, 
who hear only a foreign language at home, and who have in their 
homes little or none of the influences of culture belonging to 
their own vernacular, may be found in school side by side with 
the children of cultivated native-born Americans. In the large 



1 Introduction to Education in the United States, Prof. N. M. Butler, 
J. B. Lyon Company, Albany, N. Y., 1900. 



*]2 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

cities the same teacher often has to instruct children of Teu- 
tonic, Slavonic, and Latin origin. Many of them learn on the 
streets an English full of idioms of foreign flavour. 

Not less striking are the variations of condition due to sec- 
tional differences in life and thought. In the same city the 
Sectional widest divergences of condition are possible. The 
aria ons. children are familiar with different types of life, are 
growing up with different family and community ideals, have 
widely different bases of judgment. Town and country life, too, 
are growing increasingly different. The favoured few see both, 
— the country in the summer and the town in the winter, — 
and thus have a fuller experience. But the children of the 
poor often have no conception of nature. 1 

Other sectional differences due to other causes are quite as 
great. In many States the schools are poorly equipped and worse 
Equipment of taught. Many teachers have not even a good high 
Teachers. sc hool education. Their pay is not above that of 
the day labourer. Their position commands no respect in the 
community. The work of teaching has too long been no pro- 
fession, but only a stepping-stone to some more honourable and 
lucrative calling. Professional training, though rapidly increas- 
ing, is yet far from general, and in many communities is seldom 
heard of. 2 

Although the belief that the teacher must have a sound edu- 
cation and special training for his work is rapidly extending, 
status of the an( ^ * s firmly held in most States, especially in the 
Profession. North and the West, there are still many teachers 
who are almost what might be called illiterate : ignorant of 
science, history, and literature they certainly are. Only in a 
few fortunate localities is the ideal of what constitutes a sufficient 
education for the teacher high enough. And when the training 



1 See G. Stanley Hall, Contents of Children's Minds, New York, 1893. 

2 See also two articles on " The Case of the Public Schools," Atlantic 
Monthly, p. 402, G. Stanley Hall, and p. 534, F. W. Atkinson, Vol. 
LXXVIL, March and April, 1896. See also reports of the National 
Commissioner of Education. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 73 

and education of the teacher are sufficient, his work is often 

rendered ineffective by the conditions under which it is done. 

He frequently works under the burden of too many hours, too 

large a class, too few books ; in rooms ill-lighted, ill-ventilated, 

or resounding with the noises of the streets. 

There is no centralized authority in the United States to say 

what education shall be. The National Bureau of Education 

makes reports, issues information, gives advice, and . 

does other wise and helpful things : but it has Centralized 

Authority, 
no power as against the principle of home rule in 

our schools. The nearest approach to centralization is found 
in some States like New York, Michigan, and California, where 
a central board has the power of granting certain privileges and 
immunities to those pupils who meet its requirements in their 
own schools. But those who are most familiar with the oper- 
ations of these systems admit their present ineffectiveness in 
securing uniformity. 

Whether, indeed, a high degree of uniformity is desirable is a 
question that may well be asked, but that cannot well be dis- 
cussed here. 1 Modern education has recognized the importance 
of the individual ; and the needs of the individual community 
may be just as distinctive as the needs of an individual pupil. 
It is obvious that the inequalities in language, in race, and in 
experience of life which the children bring to school with them 
must modify or determine the methods by which English is 
taught. 

Under usual and normal conditions the teacher proceeds 
upon the assumption that the child enters school with a speak- 
ing knowledge of English. His work then is to ex- i< ore igii 
tend the child's command of the spoken language, Idioms - 
and to lead him to active familiarity with the language in its 
written and printed form. When such an initial assumption 
cannot be made, the teacher's task at once becomes wholly dif- 
ferent. It is now the teaching of a foreign language instead of 



1 See A. B. Hart, in School Review, I, 14 ff., for the negative side. 



74 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

the vernacular. It is, moreover, often the teaching of a foreign 
language to children who do not all speak the same language, 
and who have therefore, in many points, to be taught in differ- 
ent groups. 

Difference of race implies a different heritage of ideas. 
What is familiar in the Teutonic home may be strange in the 
Race and Com- Italian. Another source of difference in the mental 
munity Ideas, equipment of the child is the character of the region 
in which he is reared, and from which, quite as much as from 
his immediate family associations, he gets his notions of nature 
and of human society. The city child and the country child 
have different experiences ; the wealthy and the poor see differ- 
ent things. But the literature which they are to read, and to 
the interpretation of which they must bring certain memories, is 
the same, and hence in many cases requires for its interpretation 
experiences familiar to some children and strange to others. 

Whether these difficulties can be adequately met is still an un- 
answered question. But they must be recognized and must 

modify the teacher's work. Only a limited amount 
Language 

Teaching nee- of special work with individuals is possible. The 
essarilyim- , , . , . ... 

perfect and necessity of teaching by classes requires that in 

general the explanation of the English idiom or the 
English sentiment be the same for the Slav as for the Teuton. 
The teacher must rely upon such illustrations and parallels as the 
pupils can understand, and upon repetition of the idiom or the 
sentiment until familiarity makes it part of the mental possession. 
But no matter how skilful or how patient the teacher, there 
must remain much that is imperfectly apprehended. Under 
the most favourable conditions, in fact, any teaching of the 
vernacular will be only partially successful. Scientific thorough- 
ness and accuracy are impossible in the nature of the case. 
Approximations, partially established habits, glimmerings of 
ideas, nuances, incongruous or distorted ideas, mark the path 
of the efforts of the teacher of English. Imperfect achieve- 
ments are, indeed, the best that can be looked for in elementary 
instruction in any subject, for the infant mind is a very imper 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 75 

feet machine. Or, to speak more accurately, since the mind is 
an organism which approaches gradually to the normal type by 
processes of growth and change, and the language is a complex 
and subtle instrument which only the most highly trained and 
organized minds can use with skill, it is not to be expected that 
the elementary instruction in English will achieve much that 
can be called perfect. 

II. The Place of English in the Lower Grades 

The arguments for the old system, under which English — 
i. e. , reading and writing — held the chief place in the primary 
schools, were based partly on tradition and partly j- ormer 
on utility and discipline. It was held (i) that fgSJJffft? 
reading was the most direct beginning of the child's Causes - 
acquisition of knowledge. Knowledge was to be found in 
books, and, so far as the current conception of knowledge ex- 
tended, in books only ; it was by knowledge of books that the 
intelligent man was distinguished from the unintelligent. More- 
over, the school life was short, and the acquisition of book 
knowledge must begin as early as possible. If the knowledge 
of the school lay wholly in books, it was partly because the 
schools held a narrow, scholastic conception of knowledge, and 
partly because the simpler and less specialized conditions of 
life afforded to most children an opportunity of gaining outside 
the school-room instruction about the common activities and 
industries of society. 1 

(2) Books were, in an age and time when religious matters 
were of supreme importance, the repositories of religious tenets. 
After the Reformation the power to read was in Protestant 
countries regarded as essential to the right religious life of the 
community. 

(3) Reading offered, moreover, a valuable form of discipline ; 
and the disciplinary idea of education was secondary only to 



1 See John Dewey, " The Primary Education Fetich," Forum, XII., 
May, 1898. 



76 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

the utilitarian idea. If any defence were offered of a study 
not seen to have practical bearing on the affairs of life, such de- 
fence was almost certain to be that it afforded discipline. Of 
such distinction between educational values as that given by 
Professor Laurie 1 between training and discipline, between the 
purely intellectual value and what is loosely called cultural, the 
schools took little account. It was obvious that for the child 
the operations of reading and writing did afford discipline. 
Beginning with the more minute elements, the letters and their 
sounds, and appreciating through analytic processes their rela- 
tion to the word, and then the relation of the word to. the sen- 
tence or the idea, the pupil received undoubtedly as rigid a 
discipline as he was capable of. 

To these arguments based on an earlier point of view 
have since been added others that are based upon conditions 
less changeable. 

(4) The literary unity is, rather than the scientific, that 

which the child can best appreciate, and, therefore, that by 

which he receives the best training in thought. 
Importance _, . . r . . . ., , , 

of the " Lit- This point of view has been well expressed by 

m y ' Mr. Horace E. Scudder : 2 " To the child in his 
earliest years the most direct appeal to the imagination comes 
from the clear-sighted dweller in the ideal world. Not yet 
has experience filled him with troubled questions, with doubt, 
with perplexity of mind. He is prone to believe, not to dis- 
believe, and to him should be brought the truth-tellers ; those, 
that is, who themselves believe, whose eyes are open to the 
things of faith. Deepen in his mind the familiarity with what 
lies beyond the visual organ. He has not yet learned to be- 
lieve only what he sees. Fortify in him that power of seeing 
with the eye of faith, which is so soon to be assailed by hard 
contact with things visible and tangible. I am not pleading 
for an idle chase of phantoms and vagaries, but I ask, is there 



1 Language and Linguistic Method. 

2 " The Educational Law of Reading and Writing/' Atlantic 
Monthly, LXXIII. 254 ff., February, 1894. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 77 

not a body of literature — not the cheap production of in- 
different writers, but the rich deposit of centuries — which, by 
its simplicity, its reliance upon elemental truths of the soul, 
its homely instincts, its free spirit of wonder and belief, appeals 
directly, surely, to the imagination of the child ? 

" Hearing at once these stories from his books, the child 
recognizes no change in his habit of mind other than an 
expansion of his powers. There has been no break in his 
natural development, but literature has come in to deepen 
one great channel of his being. Not only so, but the growth 
of this supreme faculty of the imagination is not at the ex- 
pense of his other powers, the powers of understanding, of 
reasoning, and of practical sense ; it is highly stimulating to 
the development of these powers." 

(5) The material found in books is of the greatest in- 
terest to the child, — particularly story books, histories, and 

simple poems. In support of this argument it is 

• j , i-i-i -ii 1 r , ■ Interest 

cited that children, particularly those of the in- 
telligent classes, learn to read easily and are fond of reading 
for the pleasure it gives. 

The greatest problems of the school now present themselves 
not so much as questions of method as of curriculum. It is 
therefore in place to consider, in the light of present condi- 
tions, the arguments upon which the pre-eminence has so long 
been given to reading and writing in the early school years. 

It can no longer be maintained that reading and writ- 
ing are the only means of giving information in the primary 
grades. Nature study, the study of the simpler counter 
elements of materials and mechanic arts, — in BooSnofthe 
brief, the study of things in the school-room, has only Media - 
been found capable of filling the child's mind with ideas; and 
very young children can learn more rapidly and with less ex- 
penditure of energy through oral instruction than by reading. 

Still less weight can be given to the arguments based 
upon the exclusive property of books in knowledge. Knowl- 
edge, intelligence, even mental power may now be conceded 
to those whose knowledge of books is comparatively limited. 



78 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

The provinces of science, art, and practical affairs all have 
such men to show. Nor, on the other hand, is knowledge of 
books, even such knowledge as an enlightened system of in- 
struction seeks to give, sufficient to insure a liberal education 
in the highest sense of the term. 

The fact of discipline in reading and writing is not 
gainsaid. But of the value of such discipline grave doubts, 
Doubts as based on psychological researches, have arisen. 
oftheDii? 6 ^ * s ar g ue d : (#) the child has not reached the 
cipiine. stage of development at which fine analytic dis- 

criminations should be required of him. Attention to minu- 
tiae of any sort is a severe tax, which results sometimes in loss 
of interest, sometimes in injury to the nervous system, and 
arrested development. Advocates of this view argue that 
science and the manual arts are better adapted to the child's 
stage of development, and more interesting. 

(5) That discipline in and of itself is of much less efficacy 
than was formerly supposed. It has been demonstrated that 
good intellectual habits are not necessarily transferable ; that 
a high degree of accuracy in one line of activity is often found 
compatible with actual slovenliness in another. In fine, that 
discipline is valuable in and for the field of work in which it is 
given, and valueless for anything outside of that field. 1 Discipline 
in reading and writing, then, while it would make good readers 
and good writers of the pupils, would do npthing else for them. 

To the argument that the literary unity is the best kind 
for the child, the man of science is most likely to object. 
TneScien- To him the strict sequence of logic, the relation 
tilic Unity. f cause anc j effect, the grouping of conceptions 
into classes, has come to seem the easy and normal process 
of the mind. It must be admitted that children manifest 
an early interest in facts and their causes in logical relation- 
ships ; and that literary unity is often fantastic, superficial, 
or arbitrary, and based on mere seemings and unrealities. 



1 Thorndike and Woodworth, Psychological Review, VIII. 247-261, 
384-39S* and 553-564. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 79 

Children are undoubtedly interested in things that lie 
outside the realm of books. To the bright child books often 
seem dull and stupid compared with the vividness 
and reality of the world around him, with sports, 
industries, the properties of things, the wonders of nature. 

To all these arguments must be conceded a certain validity. 
Books are no longer the only vehicle of knowledge. The 
disciplinary value of learning to read and to write may be 
overestimated or misapplied. The literary unity is assuredly 
not the only method of organizing ideas that the child can 
appreciate. Nor is the material found in books always that of 
most absorbing interest to him. What then shall we accept as a 
present and approximate answer to the questions here raised ? 

(1) Although books are no longer the exclusive sources of 

knowledge, yet the printed page is still so much the means of 

recording and transmitting the majority of the 

• . ., , . J , . Books still 

world s important ideas, that the power to read is, the Principal 

r -i • 1 Media, 

in fact, more than ever a prime necessity m the 

equipment of every one for capable business activity, for 
intelligent citizenship, and for culture ; and therefore, al- 
though reading can no longer claim the exclusive place in a 
scheme of primary education, the burden of proof still rests 
upon those who would assign to it a secondary place. It is 
indispensable as an instrument for further education, and no 
abandonment or postponement of its supremacy can be con- 
sidered except upon reasonable probability of the greatest 
physical and mental welfare of the child. 

(2) Nor can the disciplinary element in the primary 
schools be ignored. It has long been recognized that an ill- 
managed Kindergarten is a foe to good work in 

the primary school. 1 In the same way the ill- Discipline 

regulated work of the primary school may breed 

habits of inattention and general intellectual flabbiness, to the 



1 For a somewhat extreme statement, see " The Kindergarten Child, 
— after the Kindergarten," by Marion H. Carter, Atlantic Monthly, 
LXXXIII., March, 1899. 



8o ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

frustration of the work in higher grades. There must be dis- 
cipline, from the beginning of the school life ; and the disci- 
pline in reading and writing is within a field of activity neces- 
sary for the child both in school and in after life. 

(3) This discipline must be adapted to the capacities of 
the child. Science and the manual arts, when well taught, 
Science and a ^ so mrms ^ discipline. They cultivate the habit 
the Manual f observation, they lead to sound knowledge of 
cient. the relations of things. They are within the range 
of the child's powers and interests. In so far they hold exactly 
the same claim to a place in the primary curriculum as do 
reading and writing. Judged by their results as well as by their 
inherent value, they have proved their right to be there. They 
do not, however, give all the training which children at this 
stage should receive. The language faculty, though more or 
less involved in teaching these subjects, can with difficulty, or 
not at all, receive through them alone the degree of develop- 
ment of which it is capable. The child's command of lan- 
guage is fixed and enriched by reading and writing ; and 
accuracy of thought and expression are almost conditioned 
upon such exercise. Interest in language itself, the conscious 
attention to expression, is an essential of the cultivated mind ; 
and such interest is more likely to be aroused if the begin- 
nings of reading and writing are made early in the school life. 

(4) The literary unity seems to be the. prevailing method of 
organization in the child's mind. The play of fancy, and even 
The Literary ^ e J m g^ e °f nonsense rhymes and the fantastic tale 
totte Child's are congenial to his taste ; here words and ideas are 
Mind. presented in an order that he can easily follow. It is 
not always the order of wisdom or of logic ; it is often the order 
of play. But play is one of the child's means of giving his 
faculties exercise. In the more serious literature, the stories of 
heroes, etc., the child finds motives that he can understand 
and imitate, appreciates the relation of motive to action, and 
so comprehends the organization, the inner unity, of the story. 
Moreover, the literary unity is the one to which he is first ac- 
customed. His playmates and his parents view life and speak 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 8 1 

of it, though crudely, in the way the maker of tales views it, 
and not as the scientist does. 

(5) Finally, since the spontaneous interests of children un- 
doubtedly include the things found in books as well as the 
things outside of books, it is advisable to seize upon this inter- 
est as early as it is available, and to turn it to account in the 
necessary task of learning to read and to write. 

The conclusion would then seem to be that the study of read- 
ing and writing can neither claim the lion's share of the time in 

the primary school, nor be put aside as a subordinate 

... -1-1 Summary, 

thing. Its necessity, its interest, and its adapt- 
ability to the child's stage of mental growth claim for it a place 
second to no other subject in the school day. 

Enthusiasts in the cause of English study have undoubtedly 
done it some harm by unreasonable demands in its behalf. 

Realizing that it needed improvement, and that 

. . . . . How much 

more concentration was one of the essential con- Time in the 

ditions to its improvement, they have argued that 

it should receive throughout the entire elementary course more 

time than all other subjects included. Such a claim disregards 

the impoverishment of the school curriculum that would result 

from curtailing the work in science, history, and the manual arts, 

and ignores the opportunities of the capable teacher for training 

in English in all the work of the school. How much time should 

be given to English it is perhaps unwise to attempt to state in 

numerical terms. During the earlier years, until, say, the 

fifth year in school, perhaps a third of the total time of the 

school can be wisely given to it. After the fifth year, when 

reading and writing have become comparatively easy, the time 

may be safely lessened, until in the last year it includes no 

more than an hour a day. Less than this it should never be. 



III. Primary Reading Matter 

In its general use the term " education " has long included, 
and is still often understood to include, little more than the 
ability to read and write. This idea survives in the legal 

6 



82 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

meaning of the term " illiteracy " : inability to read and 
write. To be able to read and write was to be " lettered," 
that is, educated. It is therefore to be expected that 
the history of the teaching of reading and writing would 
be an interesting and important chapter in the history of edu- 
cation. Learning to read and write has been to many children 
a painful process, whose difficulties have been a puzzle to 
thoughtful teachers and a stumbling-block to the unskilful. 
Quintilian thought it worth while to prescribe 1 — though with 
apologies for introducing a matter so elementary — the manner 
in which reading and writing should be begun. And so 
important did this early instruction seem to Plato that he 
dwells at length upon the kind of reading to be given to the 
youth of an ideal republic. 2 

Modern educational thought has brought to bear upon 
the subject the results of scientific experiment and common 
Modern experience as well as the deductions of philo- 

sophical speculation. To the Germans more than 
to any one else we owe the discussion of materials and 
methods, the enthusiastic advocacy of new theories, the long 
and patient series of experiment and observation. France has 
had theorists who have made notable advances in method, 
especially the Port Royalists, Rousseau and Jacotot. Eng- 
land has had some clear voices, like Mulcaster and Ascham, 
who have wisely advocated the study of the mother-tongue. 
The United States has within recent years taken up the best — 
as well as the worst — of these various theories, and by patient 
and enthusiastic discussion and experiment helped to clear 
away much of the confusion gathered around the subject. But 
the fact stands, that the development of the teaching of reading 

Our indebted- an< ^ wr ^ tm g> fr° m the long-established but severe 
nesstothe and irrational plan of beginning with the names 
of the letters and spelling them into words, to 
the kindlier and wiser methods of to-day, is best presented in 
the history of the common schools of Germany, from the efforts 



1 De Orator e, Book I. chapter i. 2 Laws, VII. 809-818. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 83 

of Ickelsamer, who lived in the time of the Reformation, to 
the practices now established in their primary schools. Within 
these four hundred years of German educational activity, virtu- 
ally every theory of what should be read, how much, when, and 
how ; every theory of how the beginnings of reading, writing, 
and spelling should be made ; in brief, the whole problem of the 
teaching of the mother-tongue in the elementary schools, has 
been considered, and tested by experiment. 

In contemplating this development 1 two phases of the sub- 
ject appear : teachers have taken thought over what should be 
read and how the arts of reading and writing should be taught. 
The question of what to read will first be discussed, in its history 
and present phases. 

The history of the modern movement begins with the period 
of the Reformation. Before that time there could not be said 
to be any general interest in popular education. Beginnings 
Following the Reformation came the wider spread Ed^atSj^the 
of the ability to read and write. Book learning Reformation. 
was less confined to clerks and monks. Skill in wielding arms 
and familiarity with the codes of chivalry were ceasing to be 
the only elements of the education of the upper classes. The 
invention of printing had made books more accessible. The 
expansion of commerce had given to education a practical 
value. The growth of the ideas for which Luther stood, and 
which implied the right and duty of every man to read the 
Bible, was a direct cause of the more general interest in 
educational methods and materials. 

Interest in the study of the mother-tongue, which in the 
eighteenth century looked to the development of its possibili- 
ties for literature, had in view in the sixteenth 

. ,. . r . , . School Read- 

century especially its importance for practical and ing at first 

ethical ends. The first school readers after 

the Reformation were, as was natural, distinctly religious 

1 This topic is fully treated in the excellent work of Carl Kehr, 
Geschichte des deutschen Unterrichts in der Volksschule. See also the 
interesting monograph of President G. Stanley Hall, How to Teach 
Reading. 



84 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

in character. Prior to the Reformation the schools had only 
an A B C book, or a primer, which contained the alphabet, 
a collection of syllables, and certain extracts of a religious 
nature. 1 In one of the school books of the Reformation 
period we find the following table of contents : a grace, 
and a thank offering after the meal, the Lord's Prayer, the 
Creed, and the Ten Commandments. In another, by Ickel- 
samer, the Ten Commandments, the Creed, the Lord's Prayer, 
the Last Supper, the Magnificat, the Benedictus, etc. Pas- 
sages from the Bible, — especially the Lord's Prayer and 
the Ten Commandments, — the hymns of Luther, and cer- 
tain other parts of the service of the church, continue to 
reappear as the principal reading matter of the primary 
schools, partly because of the serious religious temper of 
the German people, partly, no doubt, because there was as 
yet but little German literature to dispute the supremacy of 
distinctly religious writings in the affections of the people. 
The German word for primer, Fibel, is now understood to 
have meant little bible, and its purpose as an introduction 
to the Bible is evident enough. Though other types of books 
began to be introduced into the schools, and the reli- 
gious reading-books came gradually to be diluted with other 
material, the Bible continued to hold the field until the 
eighteenth century. The controversies over its use were many 
and often bitter. In the middle of the nineteenth century 
its use as a school reading-book in Prussia was forbidden by 
law. 

The second important stage in the development of the 
reading-book is represented in the work of Basedow (1723- 

1790) and the so-called philanthropinists. Rec- 
of Pleasure ognizing the hardship of learning to read, and 

the lack of interest for the child in the books to 
be read, Basedow compiled a primer in which the children 
read of things pleasant to eat and to see : of almonds, raisins, 
apples, etc. In his school the children played out in games 



1 Fechner, Geschichte des Volksschul-Lesebuches. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 85 

their learning of German and Latin, and were rewarded with 

sweetmeats when they answered well, — in short, had the task 

of learning made pure play. 1 His work called forth much local 

enthusiasm and much general scorn. But it did, at any rate, 

contribute a valuable idea to education. 

In the latter part of the eighteenth century appeared the 

first two school reading-books, in the modern sense of the 

term. Eberhard von Rochow issued in 1776 a 

1 ' The First 

book containing so-called " moral tales," illustrat- School 

ing the virtues of politeness, modesty, and so on, the "Moral 
in the place of the religious extracts of the ear- 
lier period. Rochow advised that the children should first be 
made acquainted with the simple sounds and the written and 
printed names of simple and familiar things ; that they should 
be led to talk of these, and their oral speech be made more 
ready and accurate while they were learning to read. When 
they had learned to read words of one syllable with some readi- 
ness, they took his Children's Friend, and had practice in read- 
ing simple matter adapted to their tastes and capacities. By 
this system the emphasis was thrown first upon instruction in 
language, and then upon the choice of material suitable from 
the points of view of interest and difficulty. The book is said 
to have reached a circulation of one hundred thousand cop- 
ies. The primer of Christian Felix Weisze, issued at Leipsic 
in 1772, is equally remarkable. Its title 2 indicates its char- 
acter. It contained short stories, fables, songs, prayers, little 
verses, and an illustration with each letter of the alphabet, like 
the modern nursery books. It soon attained a sixth edition 
and a translation into French. These two books are repre- 
sentative of the type of school reader which was displacing the 
religious primer, and which by the middle of the nineteenth 
century came to be generally adopted. But the struggle was 



1 For an interesting account of Basedow's work and method, see The 
American Journal of Education, V. 487-520. Hartford, Conn., and 
London, 1858. 

2 Neues ABC-Buck, ncbst einigen kleinen Uebungen unci Unterhalt- 
ungenfiir Kinder ; mit 25 ilhiminierten Abbildungen auf 13 Tafeln. 



86 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

long and often bitter. The prejudice in favour of the old was 
due not only to that conservatism which resists changes as 
such, but to a religious zeal that feared the undermining of the 
national faith. In many places the opposition to the new type 
of readers included whole communities, and in one instance 
there arose an actual insurrection, due to the omission from 
the primer of the Creed and the Lord's Prayer. 

In the interval between the Reformation and the nineteenth 
century there were of course many types of primers. Most 
of them preserved the prominent features of the older type, 
while including characteristics of the newer sort. The changes 
indicated above had in these three centuries introduced into 
school readers certain new elements: (i) a recognition of the 
child's tastes and aptitudes ; (2) the use of other than religious 
reading; (3) the introduction into the school of such matter 
as the pupil might be supposed to continue to read after 
leaving school; and (4) recognition of the importance of 
method. 

As in Germany, so in the United States, the dominant ideas 
of the people have determined the character of the school 
TheWewEng- riders. 1 From the latter part of the seventeenth 
land Primer, century to the end of the eighteenth century, 
The New England Primer* was the principal school book. 
It went through many editions, and its aggregate circula- 
tion probably reached several hundred thousand copies. Its 
origin, like that of the German primers, goes back to the 
Reformation. Henry VIII., while in conflict with the Church 
of Rome, caused a primer to be issued in 1534 (the same 
date as Ickelsamer's) with the title " A Prymer in Englyshe 
with certeyn prayers and goodly meditations, very necessary 
for all people that understonde not the Latyne tongue. Cum 
privilegio regali." In 1535 and again in 1545 he had primers 
reflecting the further modification of his religious views. The 
latter, known as the Henry VIII. Primer, was designated as 



1 See The Historical Development of School Readers, by Rudolph R. 
Reeder. 

2 See The Nezv England Primer, by Paul Leicester Ford. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION %7 

•''The Primer set forth by the King's Majesty, and his Clergy 
to be taught, learned, and read, and none other to be used 
throughout all his dominions." As preliminary to this there 
was an A B C book containing the alphabet and a catechism. 
Later they became united ; the ABC book was made to in- 
clude also the substance of the Primer, and this combination 
soon reached a wide circulation. Both the ABC book and 
the primer were thus devotional books more elementary than 
the Bible and the Book of Common Prayer, and were, like the 
German primer, religious in content and purpose. 

One of the earliest enactments of the Puritans in New Eng- 
land was a requirement that every township of fifty or more 
householders should provide a teacher for instructing the 
children to write and read, that they might know the Bible. 1 
Teachers of reading and writing and of the catechism had, 
indeed, been appointed soon after the landing of the Pilgrims. 
Out of this earnest religious purpose grew up a number of 
catechisms, the forerunners of the New England Primer, 
One Benjamin Harris, printer and author, finding London 
temporarily inhospitable to his religious opinions, opened a 
book-shop and coffee-house in Boston in 1686. While in 
England he had published in 1679 The Protestant Tutor, a 
book designed " to bring up children in an Aversion to Popery." 
It contained the " portrait of the reigning sovereign as a fron- 
tispiece, and portions of the text were the Roman Small Letters, 
the Syllabarium, the Lord's Prayer, the Creed, the Ten Com- 
mandments, the John Roger biography and verses, though not 
the famous picture of the martyr at the stake, the words of 
from two to seven syllables, the Proper Names, and a catechism, 
together with much other material for the benefit of youth and 
the injury of Papacy." 2 This book was reissued in 1680, and 
again in Boston in 1685. Some time between 1687 and 1690 
it was again issued in Boston, abridged and made more of a 
school book, under the title of The New England Primer. 



1 Records of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, II. 203. 

2 Ford, The New England Primer, pp. 34-35. 



SS ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

It soon became the school primer of New England, and is 
known to have been printed in large numbers in the Quaker 
City of Philadelphia. Successive editions modified and 
puritanized the contents. For example, the rhymes and 
pictures given with the alphabet, which at first presented 
secular and familiar ideas, gave place to purely biblical 
matter : 



The Lion bold 

The Lamb doth hold. 



Lot fled to Zoar, 
became Saw fiery shower, 

on Sodom's power. 



Time cuts down all 
Both great and small. 



became 



Young Timothy, 
Learned Sin to fly. 



The shorter catechism became a permanent part of the book. 
As successive editions appeared, various minor changes were 
made. In deference to the ideas of the new republic, the reign- 
ing sovereign's portrait gave place to that of Samuel Adams or 
of Washington. As the rigidity of Puritanism relaxed, the 
verses of the Primer grew less biblical ; but in spite of all these 
minor changes, the essential tone of the Primer remained un- 
changed until the end of the eighteenth century. Like its 
predecessors of the time of Henry VIII., it was religious, even 
doctrinal, in character, was an introduction to the Bible, and 
in general, reflected, in New as in old England, the close con- 
nection between school instruction and religion. 

After the Revolution the material of elementary instruction 
in reading in America underwent a change not unlike that 
Secular!- which it passed through in Germany. With the 

SchooiRead- g rowtn of the colonies, their experiences in the 
ing Matter. Revolution and their contact with France, Puritan- 
ism lost something of its ascendancy and a more secular tone 
entered into the school books as it had into the life of the 
people. This change of tone is clearly foreshadowed even in 
the Prime?: In other school readers moral lessons, not bib- 
lical and often prudential only, found a place. The widely 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 89 

popular aphorisms of Franklin, poetry and stories, and frag- 
ments of patriotic speeches, were now inserted. The leading 
books of this type were the spelling-book and school reader 
of Noah Webster, issued near the end of the eighteenth 
century. 

No school book has had so wide a circulation in this country 
as Webster's Speller. It is still in use in many schools, and in 
its various editions has probably reached a circula- Tlie Webster 
tion of near one hundred millions. The earlier s P eUer « 
editions contained reading matter as well as orthography and 
orthoepy. 

"The edition in use previous to the revision of 1831 
comprised 168 pages, 14 of which are introductory; 66 con- 
tain words taken from the dictionary; 29 pages contain the 
names of persons, places, etc.; 47 contain reading lessons; 
8 contain pictures and fables ; 4 contain numbers, abbrevia- 
tions, explanations of the characters used in writing, and a 
census of the United States. The edition published in 1831 
contains several poems, a moral catechist, including abstract 
treatises on humility, mercy, anger, justice, gratitude, avarice, 
frugality, industry, etc. ; precepts concerning the social rela- 
tions, in which the young man, young woman, husband, wife, 
parent, and child are all briefly instructed and admonished 
concerning their duties and responsibilities. Eight pictures 
illustrate as many fables, the first of which is the story of the 
boy that stole apples, which Mr. Scudder (in his life of 
Webster) says he has never been able to trace back of 
Webster, but through him it has become part of our mental 
furniture. This story, with the picture of the old man in his 
continental coat, knee-breeches, and high hat ; that of the 
enterprising but unfortunate milkmaid, who would have a 
green gown with the profits of milk, eggs, and chickens yet to 
be hatched ; poor Tray in bad company ; the farmer inter- 
viewing the lawyer, whose ox first was ' and then was not the 
gored one, were all read and re-read a hundred times by 
the millions of boys and girls who toed the mark and spelled 
in a row." 1 



1 Reeder, Historical Development of School Readers. 



90 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

Webster's reading-book was the third of the series known 
as a Grammatical Institute of the English Language. (A gram- 
The mar was the second of the series.) The reader 

" institute." b re its table of contents and its purposes on its 
title-page : " An American Selection of Lessons in Reading 
and Speaking, calculated to improve the mind and refine the 
taste of youth, and also to instruct them in the Geography, His- 
tory, and Politics of the United States. To which are prefixed 
rules in Elocution, and directions for expressing the principal 
passions of the mind. Being the third part of a Grammatical 
Institute of the English Language, by Noah Webster, Jr., 
Esquire." 

Within the nineteenth century the contents of readers in the 
United States have been of different types : ( i ) the graded 
word lessons, in which the reading matter is made 
Century to order, much after the fashion of the Ollendorff 

method, rather for the sake of introducing easy 
words than for any sense or form ; (2) the " moral tales," which 
held their ascendancy until a comparatively recent period ; (3) 
the patriotic selections, mainly from our own poets and orators, 
which are still recognized and defended, and confined mainly 
to the years beyond the primary school ; (4) the " informa- 
tion lessons," which are likewise retained; (5) purely literary 
extracts, ranging from nursery rhymes and tales to selections 
from Wordsworth and Tennyson. 

As we have already shown, the ideals of contemporary civil- 
ization have largely determined the selection of the primary 
Principles of reading. In the development of educational 
se ection. thought there came a time, however, when the 
pedagogical ideal prevailed ; when the reading matter was 
selected largely with reference to its power to maintain the 
interest of the children and to facilitate the process of 
learning to read, as in the work of Basedow and Rochow 
in Germany, and in readers like those of McGuffey in the 
United States. 

The third stage of the movement came in the last quarter 
of the nineteenth century, when out of disbelief in the peda- 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 9 1 

gogical effectiveness of the graded " exercises/' and in the 
cultural value of the moral tales and information lessons, there 
grew an attempt to select as school reading ma- p resent 
terial that which should combine the desired liter- Standards. 
ary worth with the qualities of thought and style suitable to the 
teaching of young children. These qualities, it was discovered, 
coexisted in a considerable amount of our good literature. A 
survey of the successful primary reading material of the present 
time indicates (1) that the pedagogical needs of the children, 
as now understood, are the principal element in determining 
the reading matter; (2) that these needs are understood to 
include (a) simplicity in thought and form of the material, 
(£) the use of familiar words, {c) the choice of material good 
in itself, either as information or as literature. Within these 
principles of choice there is, obviously, room for consider- 
able variation, both from the literary preferences of the indi- 
vidual compiler and from his notions of the educational value 
and fitness of the material. 

The question of what to read thus seems to be reaching at 
least an empirical answer. But the answer is not of that final 
sort that precludes the necessity of further discus- Books for 
sion. What, therefore, are the claims of the vari- Cnil< iren. 
ous types of reading matter given in the primary school ? What 
relations have they to the work of the school as such, and to 
those larger purposes for which the school is instituted ? 

1. Nursery rhymes, such as the Mother Goose nonsense 
rhymes, have found their way from the home into the school. 
Most of the Mother Goose rhymes have trium- Wonsense 
phantly stood the supreme literary test — that of Rhymes. 
time. 1 Some of them are centuries old ; most of them are of 
respectable antiquity, 2 and their counterparts are found among 
most of the races of mankind. Such universality and persist- 
ence depend, of course, upon their power to please children ; 



1 Many of the modern followers of Mother Goose have written well. 
Notable among them are Edward Lear and Peter Newell. 

2 See the Publications of the Percy Society, IV. 



92 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

and this is one reason for their place in the school-room. 
Children like the sounds, and remember them ; they like the 
images, and remember them. Moreover, such simple and 
primitive rhymes and rhythm, such freedom in the realm of 
vocal sound, give these nursery classics a special educational 
value. When the child in the nursery, the kindergarten, or the 
primary school repeats to himself meaningless rhymes, or 
gibberish with or without meaning, he is giving one sort of 
training to his powers of speech just as truly as he is develop- 
ing his motor system in his physical play. It is, in fact, to the 
play element in the child that these nonsense-rhymes especially 
appeal ; and the value of play in early education has long been 
recognized. 

To most children nothing can better make reading seem an 
acquaintance with real things than to read matter with which 
they are so well acquainted as with these nursery favourites ; 
and a sense of the reality of reading is of prime importance. 
To children who have not already known this child literature, 
it seems to most of us like a tardy recognition of their natural 
rights to give it to them in school. The phrases and the ideas 
contained in it are among the common literary property of the 
race, used with more frequency and more generally understood 
than the fragments from greater classics. 

On the other hand, it is objected that nonsense furnishes 
no mental food, that children should be given only what has 
logical connection, and that there is plenty of material for 
children that is equally entertaining and more sensible. To 
the last objection, primary teachers are likely to reply that 
they have not found the material abundant ; to the first and 
..second, that the demonstrated value of play in education has 
rehabilitated Mother Goose. 

2. Scenes of home-life in poetry, story, and description 
are excellent primary reading-matter. Children have a lively 
Literature interest in these familiar things. Domestic animals, 
Thing? 11 ** toys ' S ames > f°°d, nature, and all the elemental 
things that enter into their little world are to them 
matters of grave importance. Some of these things have 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 93 

found expression in literature simple enough for six-year- 
olds. Whenever the author gets the child's point of view 
and writes of what the child knows, he can get a hearing. 
Such literature has, like the nursery rhymes, the value of 
making the reading-lesson seem to the child to deal with 
real things. But for the trivial, the commonplace treatment 
of these things in made-to-order books, the present writer 
sees no place, unless it be for the sake of mere drill. 

3. Stories and accounts of primitive life have a special 
interest for young children. Waiving the discussion of the 
"culture-epoch" theory — that every child epito- pr^^g 
mizes in his development the experiences of the Life - 
race in its progress from barbarism to civilization — as not 
appropriate here, 1 we may confidently assert the interest of 
children in these types of life. The concreteness of such life is 
attractive ; the lions in the path of the cave-dweller are no 
allegorical lions of the mind, but real beasts to overcome. 
The struggles of the savages are with things that the boy can 
picture : real enemies with bow and club, real hunger and 
thirst. The Indian is troubled with no chaotic-yearnings, no 
hunger and thirst after righteousness ; or, if so, with the 
simpler forms of these wants as they are known to childhood. 
This absence of complexity in primitive life enables the child 
to see clearly the fundamental relations of life : man hunting, 
fishing, learning simple handicrafts and forming into families 
and tribes as a means of continuance of life itself. The 
primitive virtues, like physical courage and self-restraint, 
which are known to the child, stand clearly revealed. The 
crudity and cruelty of such life seldom shock him : he is 
too little acquainted with pain to suffer by imagining the 
physical sufferings that belong to barbarous life. In brief, the 
life of the savage is very near to the boy of the twentieth 
century. Nor is this sympathy at all incompatible with the 
fact that the fortunate child of to-day is far removed from the 



1 For discussions of this theory see the Introduction to H. M. Scott's 
Organic Education, Boston, 1899, and the Proceedings of the Herbartian 
Society. 



94 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

primitive savage : do not cultivated men still enjoy the battle 
scenes of Homer? 

4. Still nearer to the child is the fairy story. He lives in 

the far away; or, to speak more accurately, his imagination 

brings the remote constantly into his daily life. The 
Fairy Stories. J J 

world of faery is his ideal world, where poetic justice 
reigns supreme, where good is punished and evil rewarded, 
where the normal aspirations of childhood for the beautiful are 
fully realized, where there are no troublous limitations and con- 
tradictions as in real life. The simplicity of the fairy, realm 
lays bare to him principles of right and justice that remain 
clouded in the real world, — as, indeed, they often are to his 
elders. In the fairy world he escapes from this sense of 
perplexity and finds life " as it ought to be." Of course he 
knows it is not real ; knows that it is make-believe. But it is 
good for him to become acquainted with perfection, even in 
make-believe. 1 

The fairy story has been condemned because it is not 
"true." What its critics probably mean is, that it is not fact, 
or not true to all the phases of life. But to exclude all but 
fact is practically to exclude art of whatever kind ; to rob the 
imagination of its principal source of pleasure and one of its 
best forms of exercise ; to deprive the child of a treasury of 
memories that is in fact his hereditary right. The true 
grounds of objection are (1) against fairy stories which do 
not have the qualities of art, and (2) against the employment 
of fairy stories to the point at which the child loses his interest 
in real life. 

5. The fable is also near to the life of the child. His 

animistic tendencies make it seem quite natural to him that 

animals should talk like men. His interest in 
Fables. 

animals makes the homely forms of the fable more 

real to him : the transition from speaking animals to men 



1 See Kenneth Graham's The Golden Age, Chicago and London, 1895, 
and other recent stories of child life, for a presentation of the child's 
view of life coloured by that of the adult. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 95 

and women seems natural and easy. The fable is one of the 
oldest forms of teaching. Its origin is in the far East ; 
and its ethics are of the primitive type, sometimes of a 
type which the finer feeling of to-day rejects. Its brevity, 
its unity, and its simplicity of style make it easy to read. 
Like the nonsense rhyme and the fairy story, it is part of 
the literary possessions of the race, recurs again and again 
in literary and common allusion, and is thus one of the 
links between the primary school and the later intellectual 
life. 

One notable objection has been made to the fable for school 
purposes. Professor Felix Adler has pointed out 1 that many 
of the fables, particularly those collected under E t j!i CSO f 
the name of ^Esop, reflect a despotic civilization, the Fable, 
in which the weak are crushed by the strong, and cunning 
wins over better qualities. " A really moral spirit is wanting 
in them ; the moral motives are not appealed to. The appeal 
throughout is to the bare motive of self-interest." This 
objection seems to assume, not only that the child will accept 
the ethics of the fable, but that their effect will be permanent. 
It is at least doubtful whether he will see in the fable anything 
more than an interesting story. If he does, it is not likely 
that the selfish ethics there depicted will prove so attractive 
as to influence him deeply. Such an objection seems indeed 
to imply too much confidence in the permanence of the 
earliest moral teaching. The child's first morals are distinctly 
rudimentary. He grows from none at all through the lower 
to the higher. If his development were to cease at the age 
of seven, then we might well challenge the morals of the 
fable. Again, if the child were deeply affected by the 
sense of injustice and cruelty that the more analytic adult 
finds in these stories made under an old-world despotism, 
are they therefore to be excluded ? Is it good that all his 
reading should represent conditions ideally perfect? Must he 
not early come to know something of life as it is? Is the 



1 Adler's Moral Instruction for Children, New York, 1892, pp. 81-94. 



96 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

school to continue to present life to him only as he finds it 
is not? 

6. The myth, like the fable, is an old-world product. 1 
It is an early and imaginative people's attempt to preserve 
--J- its ideas and experiences. 2 It falls into several 

broad divisions: (i) the attempt to explain some 
natural phenomenon, like the rising of the sun or the return 
of spring; (2) the celebration of the deeds of some hero and 
benefactor, like Hercules or Hiawatha; (3) the records of 
how some custom or invention came to be ; (4) some knowl- 
edge or inference regarding human nature, like that of the 
fable. This classification does not always hold in a clear-cut 
way for particular myths; but these are the elements that 
myths contain. All of these things are within the interests 
of children. Many of the myths tell their meaning so simply 
that a child may understand. But whether he understands 
or not, the story itself is so concrete* and so interesting that 
he hears it with delight. It is not essential that the teacher 
should insist on his understanding the meaning. Let him get 
the story, and grasp the meaning when he can. The story, 
after all, is the thing. The story is what he needs to know 
in order to appreciate the significance of the many allusions 
to the myth which he will meet in his later reading. 

7. Under different religious and social conditions the Bible 
was an integral part of early instruction." What moral gravity 
The English an d what effects upon the imagination it wrought, 

we know. Modern custom has neglected it, and 
modern laws have sometimes forbidden it in the schools. The 
disuse of it is to be deplored quite as much as the abuse of it 



1 Every observer must have noted that myth-making is still in 
progress : e. g., the Lincoln myth. The present discussion refers to such 
myths as are read in the school, like the Greek, the Teutonic, and the 
Indian myth in Hiawatha. 

2 See Fiske's Myths and Myth-makers, chapter 1, Boston, 1891 ; Lang's 
Custom and Myth, New York ; and Pater's Greek Studies (Dionysus, and 
Demeter and Persephone) New York, 1895, and chapters 16 and 17, 
Part I. of Grote's History of Greece. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 97 

for narrow sectarian purposes is to be condemned. The King 
James version is one of our greatest literary treasures. It has 
permeated our English literature, in thought and phrase. 1 It 
has furnished scenes, characters, and sentences rich in their 
applicability to the life of all times. It has been a storehouse 
for poets and moralists alike. To lose it from the schools is 
to leave thousands in ignorance of it ; for the church no longer 
reaches the multitude. It is to be hoped that the time is near 
when it can be read as the great literature it really is, without 
obscuration of its beauty by the prejudices of sects or the 
smoke of ignorant commentary. 2 Many of the stories of the 
Old Testament — like those of Ruth, or of Jonah, or of Jacob, or 
of David and Jonathan ; much of the New Testament, like the 
parables, the Sermon on the Mount, and the other ethical teach- 
ings, could be read by primary children. The exclusion of 
the Bible from the schools is only another of the many unfor- 
tunate phases of religious prejudice. In a truly liberal and 
dispassionate community no such objection could arise. 

8. Poetry forms a considerable part of primary reading- 
matter. Not only may we include poetry written for children, 
like the simple and pleasing rhymes of Field, 
Stevenson, Riley, and others, but such of the 
poetry written for adults as is within reach of childish minds. 
Of this latter sort are many things of Wordsworth, Tennyson, 
Longfellow, Whittier, and other modern poets, and some of 
the easier ballads. There are some good collections of verse 
that contain much for the little children : Whittier's Child Life 
in Poetry, Patmore's Children's Garland, and Palgrave's Chil- 
dren's Treasury of English Song are among the best. 

To the teacher of English it seems hardly worth while to 
point out the linguistic and educational value of poetry for 
young children. Its ideal presentations of human life, its 
treatment of the beauty of nature, its rhythmic and memorable 



1 See A. S. Cook's The Bible and English Prose Style, Boston, 1892. 

2 The National Educational Association has recently put itself on 
record as deploring the neglect of the Bible as literature. See Pro- 
ceedings of the N. E. A., 1902. 

7 



98 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

form, justify its presence in the school. Moreover, if the 
reading of poetry is good for adults — as would hardly be 
disputed — an early and continuous familiarity with poetry in 
the school course seems a likely way of decreasing somewhat 
the neglect of poetry by adults. 

9. Other forms of literature, not already classified, have a 
place in primary work. Tales of travel and adventure, de- 
other scriptions of strange places, information, and what- 
Forms. ever enlarges the mental horizon find favour, 
provided only that they be simple enough and near enough to 
the mental life of the children to be assimilated. In the 
foregoing classification we have had in mind only those books 
that can be read by the pupil himself. As a matter of fact, 
the list of what he can enjoy is much fuller than is implied 
here. Many things can and should be read to him which he 
cannot read for himself. He can enjoy hearing Homer before 
he can read fairy stories for himself. 

IV. The Beginnings of Reading 

The discussions over the methods of teaching reading have 
been more numerous, more divergent in points of view, more 
given to minute analysis, more heated, more productive of 
vagaries, but in the outcome more conclusive, than the dis- 
cussions regarding what to read. For many centuries the pre- 
vailing method was to begin with the names of the letters of 
the alphabet and to combine these into words. Naturally the 
child had to reach by his own inference a knowledge of the 
The Alphabet sound of the letter in its place in the word. To 
e ° ' the beginner, dee-o-gee, would spell deeogee, and not 

dog, and might as well be given in the Greek delta-of?iicrongam- 
ma, so far as any real representation of the sound of the word 
is concerned. 1 That the necessary inference from the name 
of the letter to its sound can be made is established by the 
fact that children have learned to read by this method. But that 



1 Stanley Hall's How to Teach Reading. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 99 

teachers should so long have overlooked the obvious source of 
the difficulty, failing to see that the child at first tends to make 
that combination of sounds which he actually hears, is one of 
the marvels of educational history ; a marvel surpassed only 
by the fact that nearly four centuries after the needless subtlety 
of the method was pointed out by Ickelsamer, 1 teachers should 
occasionally take it up just as it was when he showed its error 
in principle. 

The particular service rendered by Ickelsamer was to show 
that the difference between the sounds and the names of the 
letters offered a difficulty to beginners, and to ickelsamer's 
recommend that at first the sound of the letter Method ' 
instead of its name be used. He separated the letters of the 
alphabet into classes distinguished by the position of the vocal 
organs, and taught first those that, like o and a, were simple 
and distinctive. He suggested mnemonic associations, as, for 
example, a is the sound made first in saying axe, o the sound 
that the driver uses to stop his horses, etc. The sounds of 
words and the letters representing those sounds were to be 
learned side by side. There was to be practice in speaking 
the words, and certainty that the thing read was understood. 
In analyzing a word into its sound elements, he would give to 
the child an image not only of the written or printed letter, 
but also of the object or animal which could suggest the sound 
of each letter. For example, if the word M'drz (March) was 
to be learned, the pupil first analyzed the word into its sounds : 
M, that of the cow beginning to low, a the sound made by the 
goose, r the sound of the snarling dog, and z the twittering of 
the sparrow. Then, lest the mnemonic device be not vivid 
enough, the pupil would point out, among a collection of 
pictures on a chart, the cow, the goose, the dog, and the spar- 
row ! If this naive belief in mere method provokes a smile, 
we should remember that the principle from which he worked 
was sound, and that Ickelsamer not only was two hundred 
years or more ahead of his time in his wiser recommendations 



1 His book for beginners was issued at Marburg in 1534. 

L. of ••-». 



100 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

regarding the teaching of reading, but also that he published a 
grammar whose protest against the Latinization of German 
grammar, whose disbelief in the efficacy of " conjugating " 
and "declining" as a means of learning correct speech, and 
whose plea for the dignity and value of the vernacular would 
all find favour among modern scholars. 

Other beginners' books — two within the same decade — 
advocated the same methods. But they were unable to bring 
The Play Ele- a bout any extensive reform in the prevailing usage. 
ment : Buno, Buno, 1 who anticipated Basedow's method of giv- 
ing the children rewards for answering rightly, thought that 
the letters were in themselves fearful things for the children, 
and advised that they should be associated in the minds of the 
learners with some natural object, which should be drawn to 
resemble, as nearly as possible, the form of the letter. Thus 
b was represented by a strawberry, u by the horns of an owl, 
h by a hen. In teaching the letters he used a story of a some- 
what crude type about the stupid Hans who was learning to 
read, and on this strung incidents and objects suggesting the 
letters. When the letters were thus learned, they were com- 
bined into syllables, much in the fashion of the a-b-abs of the 
books of a generation ago. Finally, the pupils were put to 
reading whole sentences. 

Within the hundred years following Buno's work, no im- 
portant contribution was made to the method of teaching 
reading. Imitators of Buno rang changes upon 
upon Sound; his method. Basedow (see page 84) sugar-coated 
the old letter-method. Rousseau, whose influence 
extended into Germany, advised alleviating the task by post- 
poning it and arousing interest. The next important advocates 
of better methods were Olivier, Heinicke, and Pestalozzi, at the 
end of the eighteenth century. Olivier insisted that the sen- 
tences to be read should first be spoken by teacher and pupils, 
be clearly apprehended, and sharply enunciated, that the 
organs of speech might also be exercised. The words were 



1 Buno's reading-book was issued at Dantzig in 1650. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 101 

then divided into syllables, and the syllables into vowels and 
consonants. The consonants were so pronounced as to ex- 
clude as much as possible the breathing which links a vowel- 
effect to the pure consonant sound. Those consonants which 
preceded a vowel or consonant were given with the obscure e 
following, those which followed a vowel with the obscure e pre- 
ceding. Combinations of consonants were sounded together,- 
sch in Fleisch, for example, being given as esh. When the 
pupils had learned thus to analyze words into their elementary 
sounds, the letters were taught. The consonants were classified 
and named according to the speech-organs used in enunciating 
them. Illustrated charts recalled the letter, not by^ the initial 
but by the final consonant sound : a tulip recalled the Ip in 
Tulpe. The final syllables were printed in red letters. When 
the pupils had learned to read written syllables and words, the 
master gave them the book and taught them word by word 
and sentence by sentence that which they had already 
thoroughly learned. Contemporary with Olivier's was the 
work of Heinicke. His efficiency in the cause of sound educa- 
tion was due largely to his power of ridicule and invective 
against the folly and stupidity of the unnatural letter-method. 
He recommended that the consonants, the main cause of the 
trouble, be sounded only in connection with the vowels, that 
is, in syllables. 

To the same period belongs the work of Pestalozzi. His 
general influence on modern education has been dwelt upon 
overmuch, and has no special bearing upon the p es tai zzi's 
subject of the present chapter. In his instruction Work - 
in the elements of reading, he dwelt with special emphasis 
upon the importance of arousing interest and self- activity, 
of cultivating the ear in home and school by letting the 
child hear right speech clearly enunciated, and of mak- 
ing the child adept in reading and making combinations 
of letters in j syllables. Not the names of the letters, 
but their sounds, singly and in combinations, were to 
be learned. - A typical page from his primer will show his 
method : — 



102 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 
The word gebadet is to be developed. The teacher gives, 



g- 


What 


is i 


It? 


Answer g. 


e is added 


u 


a ( 




a 


ge> 


b " " 


(i 


a u 




a 


geb. 


a " " 


u 


it u 




a 


geba. 


d " " 


a 


(( t 




a 


gebad. 


e « « 


tt 


a a 




tt 


gebade. 


t " « 


a 


a a 




a 


gebadet. 



The lack of ideas in such a lesson, and the ease with which 
it could become merely formal and mechanical, are obvious. 
Pestalozzi himself and some of his admirers later became 
doubtful of its wisdom. Although Pestalozzi attempted to 
formulate scientific principles for his method, beginning with 
the training of the organs of speech, and passing to the study 
of words and then of connected discourse, it cannot be seen 
that his contributions to this particular phase of education were 
of any higher value than those of his contemporaries, or, 
indeed, equal to his wisdom regarding the more general 
problems of education. 

Among the immediate successors of Pestalozzi, and in the 
list of those to whose efforts were due the establishment of 
modern methods, was Heinrich Stephani. His 
method, which consisted in laying stress upon the 
oral work, in using the sounds of the letters and in advancing 
by easy and simple combinations to the reading, was adopted 
by the Prussian Minister of Education in 1841. The victory 
of the sound-method over the letter-method was now estab- 
lished, in spite of the extravagance of views of some of its 
advocates, whose elaborate classification of the sounds of the 
alphabet into minute phonetic divisions, with long compound 
names to be learned by the children, resembled the fetich of 
method set up by Ickelsamer, Buno, and others. 

The " write-read method " (Schreiblese-Methode), so-called, 
is old. The Greeks and Romans made use of it: Quintilian 1 



Stephani. 



1 De O 7' at ore, I. 27. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 103 

and Plato 1 assume it as the usual thing, Comenius and Ra- 

tichius advocated it in the seventeenth century. It was argued 

pro and con in the eighteenth and early nineteenth 

, The " Write- 

century. Its opponents asserted that it doubled Read 

the difficulty of learning to read by requiring two 
things to be learned at once ; its supporters, that the in- 
terest and self-activity of the child made the learning of each 
process easier. The child's pleasure in himself making the same 
words which he has heard and read, the necessarily closer 
attention to the form and order of the letters, and the increasing 
sense of power in the lessons, are obvious advantages of the 
method. Its adoption was due mainly to the vigorous defence 
of Grafer and others in the early nineteenth century. Its 
use is now general in Germany, France, England, and the 
United States. 

The analytic-synthetic method of teaching reading, though 
it had its roots in part in the work of earlier centuries, belongs 

in its clear and definite form to the early nineteenth __ ^ 

J The Analytic 

century. It was the invention of a Frenchman, Taco- Method: 

j • j j • ^ u ^ j-1 Jacotot. 

tot, and was introduced into Germany by Gedike. 

Jacotot's own accounts of his method 2 were not clear or satis- 
factory. He seems not to have had the power of presenting 
his ideas in clear and logical form, to have been given to 
oracular deliveries such as "All is in all," and " Nothing is in 
nothing," and to have held such Utopian beliefs as that all 
persons have like abilities. In his teaching, however, he seems 
to have shown rare ability in applying fundamental principles. 
He asserts that he does not oppose nature, but imitates her. 
For the mind, he says, proceeds from the whole to its parts. 
Children learn the songs, and then the musical notes ; the 
plant, and then the stamens ; why then not the word and the 
sentence, and then the letters? Why not proceed here from 
the whole to the parts, from the known to the unknown ? 



1 Laws, VII. 818. 

2 See Enseignement universel, Langue maternelle, par. J. J. Jacotot, 
1818. 



104 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

In his teaching he would begin with Fenelon's Te/emaque, 
and have the children learn the first sentence, repeating it 
after the teacher, word by word, until the whole had been 
thoroughly learned. Thus 

Calypso 

Calypso ne 

Calypso ne pouvait 

Calypso ne pouvait se 

Calypso ne pouvait se consoler, etc., 

until her inconsolability over the loss of her hero had been 
thoroughly established. The sentence was then written by 
the children from the copy. The teacher would go slowly, 
that the child might learn all thoroughly. The second lesson 
began with a review of this first sentence, and proceeded to 
the second. In all succeeding lessons the children were to 
reproduce orally and in writing what they had learned before. 
After ten lessons or more, the teacher would question them 
upon the content of what they had read. Throughout the 
series the object was to have the whole story reproduced with- 
out error by the children. If there was too much insistence 
upon memory, there was, at any rate, a justifiable emphasis 
upon the story as a starting-point. 

The word-image and the thought are here seen to be of 
first importance. It is easily seen, too, that the child's powers 
of analysis, whereby he can arrive at the sounds of the letters and 
so become self-helpful, are trained only incidentally, if at all. 
The supreme merit in the system is that it deals first with ideas 
appreciable by the child and impresses upon his memory the 
image of the word. Letzsam presented the theories of Jacotot 
in clear form in a series of writings, simplified and modified 
them so as to retain only their good features, united them with 
other sound theories in use in Germany, and so demonstrated 
their excellence that they were adopted by law in Breslau 
in 1846. 1 



1 For a full account of present methods, see Kehr, Praxis der Volksschule. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 105 

With the work of Jacotot and its betterment at the hands 
of its German advocates in the middle of the nineteenth cen- 
tury we reach the end of our brief historical survey. As was 
said above, all the important contributions to the theory of the 
subject are included within the scope of their experiment and 
inquiry. Only the larger features of the movement have been 
sketched here, and those with unsatisfactory brevity. Students 
of the problems involved are referred to the historical sources 
given at the beginning of the chapter. 

Even a brief account of the history of methods must take 
note of the use of pictures and reading-machines. According 
to Kehr l the origin of the pictured primers is to 
be traced to the pictured Bibles of the cloister. 
The pictured primer existed as early as the fifteenth century, 
and a number are known to have been issued in the sixteenth 
century. The best known of the early illustrated school books 
is, however, the Orbis Pictus of Comenius, issued in 1657. 
Though not the first, as is often said, this book of Comenius 
is from its wide influence to be regarded " as the real father 
of all picture books for children." The most common use of 
pictures was, as in the work of Comenius, to represent some 
creature known to the child, whose cry expressed or resembled 
some sound of the alphabet, the letter and the syllable accom- 
panying the picture ; or to represent the form of the letter, as, 
for example, the common fashion of representing the German 
a by an eel. Sometimes the pictures and letters were accom- 
panied by little verses — the method adopted in The New 
England Primer. Writers of a more inventive turn of mind 
made up stories or comparisons of the letters with known 
objects, to deepen the impression upon the mind of the child. 
In the nineteenth century pictures came to be used to repre- 
sent the object upon which the child's attention was to be 
fixed, and which was to be made the subject of the lesson in 
language. 

The reading-boxes, or reading-machines, were devices to 



1 Geschichte des Lese-Unterrichts, p. 19. 



106 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

secure the interest and self- activity of the pupils in learning 
to read. Their essential elements were generally a lot of 
Reading- movable blocks or dice on which were stamped 

Machines. ^ i etters f t h e alphabet. These were to be fitted 
into a framework so as to spell syllables and words. Some- 
times the blocks were coloured, oftener plain. Some of the 
machines were of a construction so elaborate that the descrip- 
tions of them convey but a vague idea to the lay mind. Read- 
ing-machines were in use by the philanthropinists and still 
continue to be made and used. The nursery alphabet-blocks 
of the present day are in principle like the simpler reading- 
machines. 

In the foregoing historical sketch almost all the principal 
elements now included in the best plans for the primary work 
in reading are represented. The various devices 
for relieving the work of its dulness or its terror 
appear in Ickelsamer, Buno, and Basedow ; the emphasis upon 
the sound rather than the name of the letter appears in Ick- 
elsamer, Buno, and Pestalozzi ; the importance of beginning 
with an idea and proceeding by analysis to the sounds of the 
syllables and letters was shown by Jacotot ; the increased in- 
terest and self-activity gained by early combining the reading 
and the writing, the desirability of having simple and interest- 
ing material, and the help afforded by pictures, had all become 
accepted principles by the middle of the nineteenth century. 

There is, therefore, little that is new or distinctive in 
modern methods, except a judicious blending of the various 
principles and devices of earlier teachers. " The growing 
agreement that there is no one and only orthodox way of 
teaching and learning this greatest and hardest of all the arts, 
in which ear, mouth, eye, and hand must each in turn train 
the others to automatic perfection ... is a great gain, and 
seems now secure." 1 Indeed it may be doubted whether any 
definite method or system could be devised which would not 
become harmful, by growing stiff and mechanical. It is 



1 Hall's How to Teach Reading. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 107 

principally in the recognition of the participation of ear, mouth, 
eye, and hand in the work, of the necessity of beginning with 
wholes instead of parts, and of emphasizing the sounds at the 
initial stages of the instruction, that modern primary work has 
made its greatest advances. 

The first steps in learning to read are difficult. In oral 
language there is often a resemblance between sound and idea. 
But in written language the signs are purely arbi- 
trary and conventional. There is no logical reason of Learning 
why the written English word which is to recall 
the concept should appear in its present form rather than in the 
Greek or any other foreign alphabet or in the Morse code. The 
beginner must learn it in whatever form he happens to find it. 
The process of analysis involved in separating the word into 
its component parts, both as letters and as sounds, is difficult. 
Such a word, for example, as blackboard, consists of eight 
component parts as sound, and ten letters. The pupil must 
learn not only to recognize the word in print and script, and 
to know what thing it recalls, but must know it as made up of 
these elements of sound and these letters. In English, the 
difficulty is still further increased by the fact that the language 
is imperfectly phonetic. The letter g has one sound in go, and 
another in gentle ; <r is k in cat, and s in city. The selection 
of vowels in modern -English has slight relation to the sounds 
represented. A does duty for at least five sounds. / appears 
with a range of too great variety : as in machine, fit, wine, 
bird. Ough is distracting : though, thought, through, tough, and 
plough form a group arbitrary and unreasonable enough for 
tears. Then there are the " silent " letters, — not unwisely 
printed in italics in certain books of a few decades ago. Not 
without cause has been the debate over the best ways to teach 
children of tender years the art of reading English. 

The alphabetical method once universal is now seldom used. 
Under this system the child began with the alphabet, and 
learned the letters by their names. Now, it is xhe Alphabet 
obvious enough, as was pointed out by Ickelsamer, Method, 
that these names do not spell the word. But the pupil passed, 



108 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

by much repetition, through his a-b-abs into the knowledge of 
the sound intended by certain combinations of letters. Then 
through various collections of simple words, either meaningless 
and uninteresting, or didactic and equally uninteresting, the 
pupil came to a greater or less degree of power in reading. 
Exceptions were wisely treated as such, and as things to be 
learned. Much drilling in oral reading and oral spelling in- 
sured a fair knowledge of the form of the words, but at such 
a price of time and energy as a modern school cannot afford 
to pay. 

In the agitation of " methods " two new plans arose : the 
" word method " and the " sentence method." The advocates 
"Word °f eacn defended their system most vigorously. 

Sentence 1 " 1 ^ bottom the two are not so different in principle 
Method." as might seem, and are certainly not different 
enough to account for the fervour of the debates they have 
provoked. Each begins from a larger unit than the alphabetic 
sounds, and with something that can convey an idea to the 
child. The " word method " begins, as its name implies, by 
having the child learn the word, and, when a sufficient number 
of words can be recognized, learn the elements of the word, 
and words already combined into sentences. The " sentence 
method " begins with the sentence and leads the pupil to 
identify words, and gradually to know the letters and their 
sounds. Each assumes — and rightly — that the child should 
start from an idea expressed in type or script, and come by 
process of analysis to the knowledge of the elements, before 
attempting to combine minute and arbitrary elements into a 
known word. Each defers the learning of the names of the 
letters until the child has learned to read. The dispute about 
the merits of the respective systems is about over, or heard 
only as echoes in certain regions remote from the centres of 
educational activity. 

Out of the controversies in educational periodicals and 
teachers' institutes, and out of the experiments in the school- 
room, there has grown up a sort of consensus about the be- 
ginnings in teaching reading. A few general principles, sanely 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 109 

and tactfully applied, have now taken the place of elaborate 
systems, and with better results. 

The wise teacher knows that she must first accomplish 
two things with her primary class: (1) learn something of 
the range of their interests and ideas ; (2) get them ThoFirst 
into a responsive attitude towards her. " Every ste P s - 
child who enters the school-room . . . brings with him, 
not an empty head, but a mind stored with the memories of 
varied experiences. . . . What he has seen and heard, liked 
and desired, determines the net result of our teaching. For 
nothing which we attempt to teach finds lodgment in the child 
mind unless it is linked with some past experience and awakens 
actual interest." * Hence the desirability of beginning with 
an interesting object, picture, or story, and engaging the chil- 
dren in conversation about the thing seen or heard. When 
the teacher has thus elicited remarks from the children, some 
of these remarks may be written upon the board, and the 
children be told the meaning of each sentence. The sen- 
tences should contain some of the more important words 
several times. Suppose a story has been told of a dog. Talk 
about dogs could bring out something like the following : 

My dog can bark. 
My dog can bite. 
My dog eats meat. 
My dog is black. 

The teacher could point to each word as she read the sen- 
tences. The repeated word dog would soon be recognized, 
and the children required to observe it carefully. Similar 
exercises, continued several times a day, would soon make 
the children familiar with a number of simple words, and so 
afford a basis for the next step in the instruction. 

The more definite work of teaching reading now begins : 
resolution of the words into their phonetic elements. Sup- 



1 Reading, How to Teach It, by Sarah Louise Arnold. 



110 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

pose the children have come to recognize bat, cat, rat, and the 
new word mat is seen. The sound of at is known from the 

other words ; the teacher will then call upon them 
the Phonetic to observe the similarity of sound in those words 

and the similarity of form in the last part. The 
children, we will assume, have also learned in the same way 
the sound of m, as in my, moon, man, etc. They will then be 
called upon to give, first the sound of m, and then the sound 
of at, in as close succession as possible, and so get the sound 
of mat. This is a definite accomplishment for them, by the 
so-called " analytic-synthetic " method. The analysis has been 
made in getting a perception of the sound-values of the 
letters in the familiar words, and the synthesis in recombining 
these sounds into a new word. The pupil is thus put into 
possession of an instrument that he can use to help himself. 
Every sound or combination of sounds that he learns is not 
only so much clear gain in itself, but becomes a key to other 
words. Thus rack, back, tack, etc., become, a key to crack, 
black, and other words similarly built. 1 Longer combinations 
of sounds or letters like ing, ight, oard, etc., may be intro- 
duced as the need arises. 

In the use of this method it is evident that the teacher 
must keep track of the words already learned by the chil- 

Importance dren ' that she ma >" & ive tne nel P fal suggestion 
of Drill. whenever needed. There must be frequent drill 

in the recognition of the words, that they may be exactly and 
readily known, and be of real service in helping to the knowl- 
edge of new words. There must be much drill in the resolu- 
tion of the phonograms into their essential sounds : thus old 
would be resolved into the sounds o-l-d, and the sounds recom- 
bined into the sound of the whole syllable. 

It need not be feared that the work will be uninteresting. 
Children have a natural interest in words and sounds. The 



1 For a fuller discussion of this method, see an" article by E. G. Ward 
in the New York Teachers' Monograph, I. No 3, November, 1S98, 
on " The Rational Method in Reading." 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION III 

imitative tendencies, so prominent in the mental life of children, 
can be used with great effect. The mere imitation of sounds, 
independent of their meaning, the fondness for 
strange, long, or musical words, the pleasure in 
gibberish and nonsense rhymes, which most children show, 
testify not only to their delight in imitation, but to their pleas- 
ure in making sounds for the mere sake of the sounds. They 
find satisfaction also in mere activity. The teacher will there- 
fore find this tendency a constant resource in the early stages 
of language teaching, and will make use- of it constantly in 
establishing an easy and indelible association between the 
written symbol and the sound. When this delight in mere 
activity is reinforced by a sense of achievement over difficulties, 
and by giving stuff to read that has some relation to their ex- 
periences or some charm for their imaginations, their interest 
can easily be held to the work. 

One especial caution may be suggested to the young teacher. 
Children often read from their books without recognizing 
the individual words. They remember the stories verbatim. 
Every pupil in the class should frequently be tested by words, 
old and new, written on the blackboard. The teacher should 
assure herself that the children are not only able to recognize 
the words, but able to resolve them into their sound elements. 
By the end of the first year, or in the early months of the 
second year, the drill in phonetics should be a regular part of 
the daily work, and should be continued until the pupils have 
mastered it as a working method. 

But English is only a partially phonetic language. It 
abounds in anomalies of spelling. Its system of vowel classi- 
fication is wrong. And, as in other languages, the irregularities 
are most frequent in precisely those words which are most 
used. For these difficulties there is but one pedagogic rule. 
Exceptional usages, variations from the norm, and all isolated 
facts must be learned as such. 1 Rules are at first obviously a 
useless burden. Light is but little harder to learn than bite. 



Sweet, Practical Study of Languages, New York, 1900. 



112 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

The child remembers it as a fact ; and easily associates it with 
other words of the same sound-group, as might, right, etc. 
Experience has shown that the order of difficulty in form is 
not the only order — perhaps not even the principal order — 
to be followed. Many of the simplest and most common ideas 
are conveyed in words whose form is difficult ; and it is inex- 
pedient to postpone the introduction of such words until the 
pupil has mastered most of the words of simple form. More- 
over, the word of unusual form is thereby easily recognized. 
Such are the auxiliaries, might, could, would, and should ; 
names of familiar objects and ideas, house, police, under- 
stand, etc. ; names of persons and places. It is more impor- 
tant that the pupil should come as soon as possible to the 
power of reading some form of connected discourse, some- 
thing that will make the learning of all these arbitrary symbols 
seem a reasonable task, and that will provide him with mate- 
rial for thought. The timidity over words that are merely 
" big " is now seen to be as often invented by their elders as 
felt by the children. To the sweetness of much of modern 
education has been added light. Classes in the second grade, 
under ordinary conditions, can read Hiawatha without fear or 
stumbling. Give them but the means of coming at the sound 
of the word by using their knowledge of its elements, and the 
big word is exhilarating rather than depressing. 

It is not, however, to be assumed that children in the first 
years of school either hear or render all sounds correctly. 

Putting aside all considerations of dialectic varia- 
Traiaing the ... _ .... ,11 

Ear and the tion, influences of foreign languages heard at home, 

and variations from the norm of vocal language due 

to defective hearing and imperfections in the organs of speech, 

there is still a considerable difference between sounds that pass 

as English from the lips of children and those from cultivated 

adults. Reference is not made here to the accuracy and 

range of the vocabulary, but to the clearness and precision of 

the spoken word. A quick ear will detect in the enunciation 

of children imperfectly articulated consonants, and vowels 

swerving from their proper quality. The word that the chil- 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 113 

dren speak is not always the word which they hear. They 
may, for example, hear insists, and say insiss, without being 
aware of the difference. The present writer has often heard 
children say p'dnt when they thought they were saying point, 
drawr for draw, New Yawk for New York, etc. Such pronun- 
ciations are often due to dialectic peculiarities in the speech 
of the home. But inmost cases it is noticeable that the pupil 
does not at first hear the true sound, even when it is given in 
his presence. Sharp and clear-cut enunciation, not, of course, 
of the exaggerated type that errs by making obscure vowels 
full and gives to speech a pedantic preciseness like the too 
rigid separation of the words in such phrases as at all, don't 
you, and the like, but clean-cut pronunciation of the language 
as it is, should be a daily exercise in the lower grades. Much 
of the difficulty in getting control of the phonetic elements of 
the language may thus be overcome ; and much may be done 
to remedy the blurred and obscure enunciation with which 
Americans are justly taxed by English visitors. 

Where there is the influence of a foreign language daily 
heard and spoken in the home, or of dialectic variations heard 
at home, on the playground and perhaps from the teacher 
also, the case seems almost hopeless. When one considers 
the influence in our large cities of the Teutonic and Slavonic 
quality of the consonants, and the persistence of nasal twang 
or flattened vowels in communities of nearly pure American 
descent, one is fain to accept them as symptoms of that flux 
and growth of language for which the schoolmaster has no 
responsibility. 1 

The growing use of print as a means of communicating ideas 
tends to make us forget that language is in its essence as well 
as its origin oral, a thing of the vocal organs and the ear. 
In teaching reading we are teaching the art of quick and easy 



1 See Rein's Encyklopaedisches Handbuch der Pcedagogik, article on 
" Mundart in der Volksschule ; " Brander Matthews, The Parts of Speech, 
New York, 1901 ; A. S. Hill's Our English, New York, and Kittredge 
and Greenough, Words and their Ways in English Speech, New York, 
1901. 

8 



114 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

association of the printed or written form with the auditory 
image and the idea. We must have the pupils ultimately reach 
The Real a ^igh facility in passing direct from the crowd of 

Languageis symbols on the page to the ideas they suggest, 
the Ear. Good reading implies not merely the recognition at 

a glance of the idea for which the word stands, but that sentences 
and even paragraphs must be read " on the run." But in the 
primary grades the transition from printed symbols to idea is 
for the most part necessarily through the auditory image. 
Hence children and imperfectly educated adults may be seen 
to move the lips as they read. They are calling up more or 
less distinctly the sound image of the word. And this is well ; 
the real word is a sound ; it is a spoken and heard thing, — 
a " winged word." Nor is the swift absorption of the mean- 
ing of sentence or paragraph by the trained adult the whole 
art of reading well. The higher kinds of literature demand 
that the sound images be present while we read, or the reading is 
imperfect. Tennyson and Milton, when read as one reads the 
newspaper — for the idea only — cease to be literature in any 
real sense. One must hear Milton's verse, or he is not reading 
it. This delight in the mere sound of verse and of good prose 
is often seen in school children. By all means let it be fos- 
tered ; it will minister not merely to clearness in reading, but 
to aesthetic enjoyment. 

Learning a language, whether the ^vernacular or a foreign 
language, is not a mere act of acquisition. Storing the mem- 
Relation or y * s oru y one P art °f the process. There must 
Reading and ^ e a ^ so re fl ect -i° n an d expression. When one 
Expression, thinks in a language, one is learning it. When 
he puts his thoughts into connected discourse, he is gaining 
not merely a clearer notion of the meaning of the words and a 
better memory of them, but he is training his mind in seeing 
relationships. Without this element language study is not 
much above rote-work : it yields no training in thought. Nor, 
without the stimulus and interest of the thought element, can 
the acquisition of the language go satisfactorily forward. Hence 
arises the necessity for choosing, as the basis of primary in- 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 115 

struction in language, not only such material as will enlist the 
interest of the pupils, but such as will also afford the opportun- 
ity for the best training in thought which they are capable of 
receiving. 

Before leaving the topic of the teaching of reading in its 
earliest stages, certain topics of minor importance but of con- 
siderable aggregate value must be briefly considered. Brief 
reference has been already made to the controversy of the 
" word method " vs. the " sentence method," and the con- 
clusion drawn that no matter which be used the real work in 
reading, i. e., the power to be self-helpful, begins when the 
pupil analyzes the word into its sound elements and letter ele- 
ments, and makes of these elements the synthesis which presents 
a new word to his consciousness. It is therefore of some 
importance what words are taken for the first steps in this 
process. 

These first words, 1 called " normal words," must be chosen 
with reference (1) to their necessity in sentence building, the, 
is, an, etc.; (2) to their power of presenting an Normal 
idea to the child which he can grasp and in which Words# 
he is interested, as, dog, boy, books, run, etc.; (3) to their 
similarity of form to other words, in order that by inference 
the pupil can reach a conception of the relation between a 
certain group of symbols and a certain constant of sound, as 
in bat, cat, hat, etc. Many such lists of " normal words " 
have been offered. It is obvious that any effective list must 
be selected also with reference to the particular group of chil- 
dren with whom it is to be used. It must include only words 
which are already in their vocabulary, and which represent 
ideas familiar and interesting to them. For their first task is 
not to learn new words, but to learn old words under a new form. 

The " normal " or " model " sentence used for the first 
exercises in reading should be selected in accordance with 



1 See Kehr, Geschichte des Lese-Unterrichtes, pp. 109-110, and Ward, 
" Rational System of Reading," New York Teachers' Monograph, I. 
No. 3, 



Il6 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

similar principles. It must reach the interest and under- 
standing of the pupils, must therefore embody familiar and 
Model simple words, and must be short enough to be easily 

Sentences. grasped. In addition to these qualities it must 
have some real thought and be able to give some exercise to 
the child's reason or some satisfaction to his aesthetic faculty. 
Sentences made to order on the plan of the Ollendorf lessons 
in French and German, and involving impossible and absurd 
collocations of ideas, are not the type of sentence to cultivate 
the power of thinking. As Professor Sweet has pointed 
out, 1 the best model sentences are those which contain a 
rational idea and in which some familiar or necessary rela- 
tion is set forth ; so that the reader may get at the mean- 
ings of the words not only by the processes of analysis of 
their form, but by just inference. The sun rises in the 
east, and sets in the west, is a good example of such a model 
sentence. 

Whether the lessons read by the child should be in script or 
in print is still in debate. Obviously, the print is simpler than 
Print or the cursive script, since the letters in print are not 

Script run together, and since they are not subject to the 

same variations in form. But, on the other hand, the script 
can be seen to grow under the children's eyes, can be turned 
to account to record at once the ideas of the children, and is 
the form in which their own ideas are to find written expres- 
sion ; nor is the script of much greater difficulty than the print. 
Although the print is somewhat the simpler, the script seems, 
therefore, to be the more useful in the practical work of teach- 
ing reading. 

The objections to the use of the cursive script have been 
much lessened by the wide introduction of the vertical script 
Vertical as a substitute for the slanting script. This new 

Script. form of writing is so much more legible, and is so 

much nearer in its general appearance to print, that the tran- 
sition from script to print is comparatively easy. The principal 



1 Practical Study of Languages, pp. 131 ff. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 11/ 

arguments 1 which have led to its general adoption are ( i ) 
that it can be written in a more erect and therefore more 
hygienic posture, and (2) that it is more legible because it is 
easier for the eyes to follow vertical than slanting lines, and 
(3) that it is more rapid. To these arguments it is objected 
(1) that the slanting script may also be written in an erect 
posture, (2) that it has more, beauty, (3) that it is more 
rapid, (4) that it gives greater scope for individual variations 
in handwriting. 

In some cities, as in New York, a modified form of the ver- 
tical has partly displaced the absolutely vertical, largely on the 
grounds of speed. In the present unsettled state of the matter, 
it seems safe to say only that while the advocates of the verti- 
cal script have the better of the argument as to legibility and 
hygiene, they have not had time as yet to demonstrate the 
superiority of their system for speed and individuality of form. 
A full test of these matters should be reached within a few 
years, when the children trained in the schools shall have taken 
sufficient part in active business life. 

Some difference of belief and practice still exists with refer- 
ence to the first instruction in writing. That the earliest writing 
should be in large free hand, in pencil and on un- 

ruled paper, or with crayon on the blackboard, instruction 
1 v ' J ' in Writing. 

seems to be accepted. Young children have not 

sufficient co-ordination of nerves and muscles for the minuter 

movements ; nor are such movements hygienic either in 

their effects on the nervous system or on the eyes. If forced 

upon the children too early, they are likely to result in a 

cramped and awkward movement that persists in the later 

handwriting. The earliest attempts should, of course, be 

imitative, and accompanied with no detailed instruction, 

except in the holding of the pencil or crayon. 

As to the time when the work should begin, teachers differ. 



1 See, for example, the pamphlets by C. H. Ames, published by D. C. 
Heath & Co.. Shaw's School Hygiene, New York, 1901, and M. M. 
Bridges, A New Handwriting for Teachers, Clarendon Press, 1902. 



Il8 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

The " read-write " method of teaching reading, which requires 
that writing be begun earlier, within the first two months of 
the primary work, seems to be sustained by experience. In 
some schools, however, no writing is allowed until the begin- 
ning of the second year, on the ground that, if begun earlier, 
(i) bad habits will be formed, (2) the children will have the 
double task of learning to read and write at the same time, and 
(3) the work of writing is too minute and particular a task for 
children under seven years of age. The last argument is an- 
swered by an appeal to experience, and the second has been 
answered in a previous paragraph. The first argument, the 
danger of the formation of bad habits, seems to ignore the rec- 
ognized methods of growth in the mental life of children. In 
all their activities, both motor and mental, they grow by practice 
from the crude and imperfect to the less crude and imperfect. 
To delay the attempt at any kind of action beyond the point 
at which the child is ready and willing to make the attempt 
would be like postponement of the opportunity to walk or to 
talk when the impulse prompts to these activities. The sole 
question is, therefore, not at what age children can begin to 
write well, but at what age they can and will make the attempt 
to write. This period seems to be early in the first year of 
the primary school. 

Among the objects of the instruction in English is the 
oral rendering of the thought on the printed page. As the 
Reading whole energy of the pupil* is at first employed in 

Aloud. making out the single words, oral reading is likely 

to be dull and monotonous. From the first, therefore, there 
should be practice in reading aloud sentences and stories that 
are known to the pupils, and others that can be read with 
considerable ease. To the same end the school exercises in 
oral reading should have in view as a purpose distinctly recog- 
nised by the pupils the conveying to the other members of the 
class and to the teacher the meaning of the sentence or the 
story. If the tone is monotonous, the pupil should be asked 
to put aside the book and tell the thing. Different renderings 
of the same sentence by various members of the class and by 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 11Q 

the teacher will serve to show how the idea changes with the 
change of emphasis. Each pupil will thus show what the sen- 
tence means to him. The clear enunciation and correct pro- 
nunciation of the words, and the right use of the voice, will 
be seen in their real relations as a means of conveying ideas 
easily. That we speak to be heard and understood, is a point 
of view that children can well appreciate. 

Among the devices familiar to many is reading " in con- 
cert." * It seems a simple means of securing the activity of 
all the pupils. But a little analysis of the process Reading "in 
makes its value appear very doubtful. The slower Concert." 
pupils lag behind, or mumble some approximation to the right 
words that is lost in the general volume of sound ; individual 
difficulties are thus lost sight of. Interpretation and expression 
are sacrificed to a meaningless and monotonous rhythm. A 
little careful drill of small groups of pupils, while the rest of 
the class are kept busy at their seats, will prove a much more 
effective way of giving individual help. 2 

In former paragraphs we have dwelt upon the importance of 
correct and clear enunciation. This should be sought not 
only in the general reading-lessons, but through Clear 
the instruction of individuals or small groups of Enunciation, 
children. It should not ordinarily be needed beyond the first 
two years of school, if properly attended to in those years. 
Daily attention to clear speaking, with occasional exercises to 
break the habit of mumbling and to secure proper use of the 
vocal organs, will do much. The primary teacher has many 
things to learn ; but surely a little training in the correct use of 
the organs of speech, and in suitable exercises for children, 
might without objection be added to her equipment for her 
important work. 



1 J. M. Rice, The Public School System of the United States, and Sarah 
Louise Arnold, Reading, How to Teach It, 216-221. 

2 One of the authors has seen concert reading in which the teacher 
showed the skill of an orchestra leader in detecting variations and errors. 
Such skill in the teacher would, of course, remove one of the objections 
to the plan. — F. N. S. 



120 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

In close connection with the foregoing topic the subject of 
" word analysis " presents itself for consideration. In the 
Word paragraphs on phonetics attention was called to the 

Analysis. method of analyzing the words into their sound 
elements, as a necessary step in learning to read. In the 
earlier employment of the word and sentence methods, the 
error was often made of neglecting the analysis of words into 
their sound elements. The natural result was that children 
knew words imperfectly and incompletely, confused words of 
similar form with each other, and spelled absurdly. The only 
way of avoiding such carelessness seems to be to fix the atten- 
tion upon the words not merely as wholes, but upon the parts 
of which they are made. This must be done (i) by careful 
attention to the elements of the spoken word, both in the aud- 
itory image and in the enunciation, and (2) by careful atten- 
tion and frequent drill in the elements of the written word. 
Attention must be given to syllabification, connected with the 
sounds in words that are perfectly phonetic, and fixed by 
practice in writing in all words that vary from the phonetic 
norm. The memories of the sound, the articulation of the 
written form, and the motor movements of writing the words 
should reinforce and support each other; the difficulties in 
visualizing the words fully and clearly, or in getting the clear 
auditory image, should be noted and removed as far as 
possible by practice. Carelessness and indolence should, on 
the other hand, be recognized for what they are, and treated 
with the same tact and persistency applied to other moral 
delinquencies. 

Modern conditions are not adequately recognized in ele- 
mentary instruction unless account is taken of two widely 
Sight different kinds of reading : the minute and careful, 

Reading:. an( j ^g ra pid an d cursory. Some things are to 

be studied, others merely skimmed ; and this distinction 
should appear in the earlier work. At first the attention is 
wholly absorbed by recognizing and analyzing the words. 
Then, when a certain facility is attained, some things are 
to be read with especial care, for the mastery of the idea. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 121 

At this point the child can be made to appreciate the necessity 
of rapid reading and of careful and repeated reading. 

V. Composition in Elementary Schools 

The teaching of composition in elementary schools has in 
recent years assumed considerable prominence. A half-century 
ago, in the common schools of this country, such 
teaching was much more limited in amount and Aims and 
kind. The theory of the instruction seems to 
have been that a knowledge of grammatical laws, of the mean- 
ings of words, of usage, of spelling, and of punctuation was for 
the elementary pupil the proper and sufficient preparation for 
the writing of the composition. To these things there was 
added drill in sentence structure and some instruction in figures 
of speech. Transcription of the copy-book sentence, and ex- 
ercises in dictation, in letter writing, and in paraphrasing served 
for practice in acquiring the correct forms of written expression. 
Weekly or monthly set compositions were sometimes required. 
These were usually upon subjects either of a strictly informa- 
tional character, such as the lives of notable men, or upon 
abstract subjects. Two characteristics of this instruction stand 
out quite clearly : ( i) It proceeded from the part to the whole, 
that is, from the v/ord to the sentence, and sometimes from 
the sentence to the paragraph. It laid emphasis upon the 
details, upon the forms and the various mechanical and con- 
ventional elements of the work before considering the entire 
composition. (2) Its treatment of the thought side of the work 
was inadequate. It either assumed that the material for writing 
was already in the child's mind, as in its choice of abstract 
subjects, or, as in its informational subjects, left the gathering 
and ordering of the material to the child's unaided efforts. 

Such a system was, of course, unsatisfactory. The insistence 
upon the mechanical side to the neglect of the ideas deprived 
the work of interest to both pupil and teacher, and Their 
made it perfunctory and artificial. Lacking ideas, Defects * 
it lacked both interest and dignity, and the instruction in 



122 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

English sank back upon spelling and formal grammar, where 
at least something definite and tangible could be found. That 
some good results were obtained is not to be denied. The 
emphasis upon " correctness " could not fail to have good 
effects in many cases. But of the larger aims of composition 
teaching, as now commonly understood, of the training in 
thought and in the gathering and ordering of material, of the 
sufficient practice that brings easy and orderly writing, the 
older type of instruction took no heed. In recognition of 
the defective standards once everywhere prevalent, Professor 
Laurie writes : " The word ' essay ' is a hateful word ; it is 
associated with so much in schools, especially girls' schools, 
that is false and hollow and showy." * 

Since the recent general stimulus of interest in English 
teaching the fundamental principles of composition work have 
been variously apprehended. By some writers the emphasis 
is laid mainly upon practice ;j 2 by others, the training of 
the imagination has been given special importance, 8 and in the 
view of yet other writers the training in thought, both in the 
gathering and ordering of material and in the process of ex- 
pression, is the principal object. According as the one or the 
other of these objects has been uppermost, the scheme of in- 
struction has been determined both in material and in methods ; 
hence the special emphasis upon daily themes, or upon the 
writing of original stories, or upon the systematic plans for 
gathering and arranging material. An important difference of 
opinion appears, too, as to the degree to which special in- 
Present struction and drill in the laws of composition and 
Problems. ^ e conventional matters of writing should be 
carried. Shall we begin by finding something interesting to 
write about, and give the attention first to arousing interest in 
the subject? Or shall we first insist upon the power to form 
sentences and paragraphs according to good rhetorical princi- 



1 Language and Linguistic Method. 

2 See, for example, the Harvard Reports on English. 

3 See The Problem of Elementary Composition, by Elizabeth H. Spald- 
ing, Boston, 1896. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 1 23 

pies, and then seek for the interesting thing to say? What 
type of subjects shall then be chosen? Shall there be daily 
written exercises ? Or less frequent writing, with more criti- 
cism? These and many other questions arise in the work of 
the elementary teacher. 

The general aim of elementary composition teaching seems 
to the present writers to be, primarily, not the acquisition of 

an art, nor the cultivation of a science, but the 

The Aims : 
training of the mind through the acquisition and l. Training: 
. , . , „« . . , . in Thought 

expression of ideas 1 his view does not ignore the through 
_ , ... ,, , . , Expression, 

fact that writing is an art, or that in some degree 

the elementary study of language is a science ; but it makes the 
purpose of teaching composition in the schools parallel with the 
purpose of teaching other subjects, that is, to lead the pupil 
to learn something and to express it clearly, either orally or in 
writing. A defence of this principle as a basis in teaching 
composition is no more needed than in other school subjects. 
It is indeed the general problem of instruction. Even the 
manual arts have the same end in view, though the expression 
there is through another medium than words. 

Education is a process whereby the child is brought into in- 
telligent and interesting contact with the world, with the 
material world about him, and with the world of the human 
spirit, both present and past : a process involving the growth 
of his own power and capacities by careful observation, 
correct inference, and adequate expression. 1 The teach- 
ing of composition should, we believe, aim at precisely 
these things. It succeeds when the pupil has learned to 
see, to think, and to express; when his mental life has 
grown richer and more interesting, his views of things 
more just, his knowledge and his inferences more clearly 
expressed. The purposes of teaching composition are, there- 
fore, as was said before, the same as the aims of the rest of 
the curriculum. The same view is more radically stated by 



1 See the well-known statement of President Eliot, Educational 
Reform, 410 ff., New York, 1898. 



124 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

Meiklejohn : 1 " The idea that composition is artificial, and the 

fact that we postpone the teaching of it until very late, give 

rise to the vulgar belief that it is a ' subject ' like French, or 

Latin, or history. But composition is not a ' subject.' It is 

quite an ordinary practice — a very general activity. ... If 

it is not a subject, oral composition ought to be begun as soon 

as the pupil can read, and written composition as soon as the 

pupil can write. In fact, writing and speaking are simply two 

forms of one mental act, — the act of expression." 

Such a statement, however, goes too far. There is a certain 

body of facts and principles, some of them purely arbitrary 

and conventional, others logical and inherent in the 
2. Teaching; r . , . , . , 

the Media of nature of our mental processes, which must be taught 

principally in the lessons in composition. Some of 

these principles, though involved also in the teaching of other 

school subjects, such as the arrangement of ideas in clear and 

logical order, are most effectively presented in connection 

with composition ; and many of the arbitrary and conventional 

facts of the language, such as spelling, punctuation, etc., are 

purely matters of the "subject" English. So that while the 

primary aim of the work is, as stated above, to train the mind 

through the acquisition and expression of ideas, the second 

aim must be to teach those facts and principles of language 

which are the necessary media of successful expression. 

If the foregoing aims be accepted as^a proper basis for the 

work, the first consideration of the teacher is seen to be the 

Material for gathering of the material. " Matter before form " 

Composition. is an e d UC ational dictum, rendered valid by both 

the interests and the powers of the children. Every observant 

teacher knows that children are interested in (i) the world of 

visible and external facts about them, (2) the world of story, 

whether history or fiction, (3) the explanation of things. He 

knows further that only certain types of facts in life and certain 



1 See Meiklejohn, The Art of Writing English. See also School 
Review, I. 660 ff., where Professor Barrett Wendell calls attention to 
the fact that most of the English teacher's knowledge is assumed to 
be common property. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 12 5 

types of action in story are apprehended by them, that the 
power of apprehension varies somewhat in the individual 
pupils and in different schools, and that, however active the 
child's interest in the reason of things, he can go but a little 
way in explanation or exposition. 

In general, therefore, the material for composition must be 
drawn from the child's daily experience and from the stories 
which interest him. It must be selected, more- interest and 
over, not merely by this general rule, but by fJentiaif 6 
means of the teacher's actual acquaintance with 
the experiences and interests of the class. Knowledge of 
the subject and interest in it are of the first importance. 
The unfamiliar and difficult act of writing is of itself a 
barrier to expression in the earlier stages of the work. 
The mere thought of having to "write a composition" 
is often enough to scatter the child's ideas to the four 
winds. Ask him, therefore, to tell on paper something which 
he knows too well to forget, and in which he is too much 
interested to be daunted by the mechanical difficulties of 
expression. 

For the observant child — that is, for the child of normal 
type — life is full of such material. He talks of it freely and 
often ; his mind has grown through such observations and ex- 
pressions. But when he is asked to write his memories some- 
times desert him. Here is the teacher's opportunity and 
duty, — to find the material that the pupil knows, and to 
bring him to the expression of it. A runaway horse, a fire 
alarm, an arrest, the construction of a building, a Types of 
" sandwich man," or any one of the hundreds of Sul)ject ' 
striking objects and incidents seen on our city streets, may 
be selected. The child's home life, his games, his pets, or 
his toys will seem to him worth talking about. So, too, 
the stories that he has read, in school or out, are good 
material for his work in composition. Early in the in- 
struction, the material that he has learned in other school 
subjects can be employed : his history, his science, or his 
manual training. 



126 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

Pictures that tell a story or give a scene clearly can be in- 
terpreted in words. 1 In those that invite a comparison the 
Use of pupil may note points of likeness or of difference. 

Pictures. Such a challenge to the inventiveness of the pupil 
as this, or as in a partially told story which he is asked to com- 
plete, brings excellent results. The quantity of good material 
is, in fact, very large. If the composition work lacks interest, 
it must be because the teacher lacks either ingenuity or the 
capacity to enter into the interests of childhood. Life is 
everywhere interesting enough, and the normal child suffi- 
ciently alive. 

It is not enough, however, that the material should be inter- 
esting. It should be capable of use for the aim of composition 
teaching : the cultivation of the mind through thought and 
expression. It must be sufficiently knowable by the child to 
give him some clear and definite things to say, and it should 
stimulate his observation and his thought. In the later stages 
of the work, the material chosen should frequently afford 
opportunity for the ordering and arrangement of ideas into 
some sort of unified form. For example, such a topic as 
How I Spent my Vacation is not of the best ; for it is likely 
to bring forth only a string of co-ordinate and more or less 
disconnected ideas, succeeding each other with a series of 
ands. A particular incident of such a vacation, as a fishing 
trip, or a boating accident, or a ride in the hay-field, is much 
more susceptible of the orderly treatment which results in 
good form. It is to be noted, too, that, especially in the 
lower grades, incidents are, in general, better than scenes; 
narration is better than description, for both interest and ease 
of telling. 

Not only the matter but also the motives of the earlier 
exercises are important. The making of a sentence or a para- 
graph may not be a comprehensible or interesting purpose to 



1 Such pictures are now generally found in school books as well as in 
books made primarily for entertainment. The making of good and cheap 
reproductions of fine pictures is now common. See, for example, the 
catalogue of The Cosmos Pictures Co., New York. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 1 27 

a young child ; but the telling of a story or the writing of a 
letter will be. Why should one write, but to communicate 
ideas ? A story or a message told in a letter, to pj rst Exer- 
be sent, as letters should be, to an absent acquaint- and S story? rS 
ance, will seem to the child a reasonable motive telliQ £- 
for writing. 1 So will the writing of a short story to be read 
to the class. As language always concerns two, him who talks 
and him who hears, or him who writes and him who reads, 
its employment in teaching should recognize this natural 
relationship. 

Considerable emphasis has elsewhere in the present volume 
been laid upon the value and necessity of oral language. In 
the employment of it one of the objects should be, 0ral 
as said before, to break down the barrier between Composition, 
oral and written composition. The pupil should realize that 
composition is with him "a habitual activity," that every time 
he talks he is composing, that the written composition is only 
the same thing in another form, though perhaps a little more 
carefully considered and executed, and that his habits of speech 
and of writing can each be brought to reinforce the other. 
Always in the lower grades, and often in the upper grades, 
the set composition should first be given orally : the ideas be 
told and retold and the telling criticised by various members 
of the class. Such a process bridges over the formidable gap 
between oral and written speech, making the latter distinctly 
easier and more natural. 

After the earlier efforts, which should be very short and 
rather frequent, the interest can gradually be directed toward 
the forms. The conventions of writing and print- The Forma i 
ing sanction certain usages, as seen in the books Elements, 
read and in the written language of the teacher. There are 
capitals, punctuation marks, fixed ways of spelling words, etc. ; 
a sentence says something completely, and not in unrelated 



1 Excellent models for use in this kind of work are some of the letters 
of Phillips Brooks, Lowell, Dickens, Stevenson, Eugene Field, and 
Macaulay. 



128 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

fragments. These matters must be learned, and when for- 
gotten, as they will be many times, learned again. They are 
to be learned, moreover, not by rule, but rather by observation 
and practice, and fixed in memory by the simplest possible 
statement of the rule or principle. Not too much at once, 
and the most essential things first, are good working rules. 

It is appropriate here to review some of the other common 
forms of school work in language. Among the first in place 
Transcrip- anc ^ vame j * s transcription. Professor Laurie has 
tion « said : 1 "To make boys and girls sit down and 

write out, with due attention to legible writing and punctua- 
tion, prose paragraphs and poems from celebrated authors, is 
an admirable exercise. It gives linguistic material. At all 
ages, but especially in the earlier years of language-teaching, 
this exercise should be almost a daily one. . . . There is no 
strain in this exercise, and it is all the better for that." Such 
exercises are of special value for pupils who, through either 
carelessness or lack of memory, are deficient on the formal 
side. But the method might be easily abused. The choice 
of material not interesting or intelligible to the child, or too 
long in quantity, could only bring disgust with the process. 
Moreover, it would be unfortunate to allow this easy device 
to supplant the need of inventiveness on the part of the 
teacher. It is, after all, only one of those good formal proc- 
esses against the usurpations of which teachers must be on 
their guard. 

Some of the best methods in teaching are among the old 
methods. Dictation is one of them. It trains the ear, con- 
nects the oral with the written language, brings 
Dictation. , , ., . r . . & 

the pupil gradually to the power of writing auto- 
matically the word that is in the mind, and has the advantage 
of being easily comparable with the correct model. If the 
material for dictation is taken from books in the pupils' pos- 
session, the self-criticism of the pupils can be made most 
helpful. 



Language and Linguistic Method, p. 56. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 1 29 

Probably the most common form of composition in our 
schools is the writing of " reproductions " and paraphrases. 
By the former is meant giving a somewhat con- Rei)roduc . 
densed report or transcript of a selection either of tions « 
prose or poetry. As a means of acquainting pupils with good 
literature, of affording something interesting to tell, and of 
training in getting at the essentials of a passage, it is excellent. 
Moreover, if the material is simple, it serves . in some degree 
also as a model for the pupils' own efforts at original composi- 
tion. The degree of fulness with which the passage should 
be reproduced will, of course, vary with the circumstances. 
In general, the aim should be to have the pupils' work full 
enough to be interesting to their classmates. In the upper 
grammar grades a useful form of exercise is the making of 
brief abstracts of paragraphs, such as are the headings of 
newspaper articles. 

Paraphrases have been a much abused school exercise. 
They have served to fill many an hour for helpless teachers, to 
disgust pupils with many a beautiful piece of litera- 
ture, and to provoke lively invective from many ap 
a school reformer. Says one of these, " A more detestable 
exercise I do not know. It is a vile use of pen and ink." 
Undoubtedly it often is. To take a thing of beauty, and 
to degrade it into a muddle-headed and absurd form, does 
seem a kind of sacrilege which it is hard to defend. Cer- 
tainly the claim that paraphrasing is a means of cultivating 
a good style seems ridiculouSo As an exercise in com- 
position, it might well be abandoned. But as a means of 
bringing a pupil to see that he does not fully understand 
the meaning of a passage, or to realize the fulness of meaning 
packed into small compass, and therefore as an occa- 
sional adjunct to the teaching of literature, paraphrasing may 
serve a good purpose. Besides, do not critics — and good 
ones, too — use it now and then to make clear an obscure 
passage ? 

One of the first essentials to both clear thinking and clear 
expression is a sense of the form of the sentence. It is a unit 

9 



130 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

of thought as well as a form of thought. 1 A sense of the form 
of the sentence has, of course, been emerging from the broken 
Sentence speech of infancy ; and the same inductive proc- 

Structure. esses will continue to make it clearer in the 
primary grades. Helped by the teacher, with such questions 
as "What did you say about this thing?" or "What was it 
that you said about this?" the conception will grow more 
rapidly. By the third year in school, children can be taught 
definitely that the sentence has two parts, subject and predi- 
cate. Later, by the fifth year, at least, they can learn to 
separate these parts from one another in complete sentences, 
and to see that a compound sentence has two or more of each 
of these parts, though it would probably not be worth while to 
introduce the names complex and compound. The immediate 
purpose of this instruction is not grammar, though it prepares 
the way for grammar as a later study, but composition, — com- 
position viewed as above, as clear thinking and clear expres- 
sion. The knowledge of the structure of the sentence is 
almost a necessary condition to such critical questioning of 
thought and expression as the teacher must do in any adequate 
treatment of written work. The clearing up of obscure rela- 
tionships, the testing of hazy conceptions, can be facilitated 
by such means. Moreover, the rhythm which is an element 
of good writing and to which the ears of children may be 
made sensitive, is better appreciated when they have a clear 
conception of the sentence. 

Drill in the sentence, oral and written, should be a regular 
part of the language work. Imperfect sentences written by 
the children should be made better by the class. Ideas should 
be stated and restated, until they are in good form. Sen- 
tences incomplete in predicate or subject should be filled out, 
loose sentences made compact, etc. An admirable form of 
exercise is suggested in a certain text-book on composition. 2 



1 It has, however, been argued, especially by Dr. E. H. Lewis, that the 
paragraph is the unit of thought. This seems to apply rather to the 
educated mind than to that of the child. 

2 Goyen's Principles of English Composition, New York 1894. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 131 



A clear sentence, preferably from books in the possession of 
the pupils, is arranged in parts under heads as follows, to 
be cast into good form by the pupils. 



Subject. 
squadron 



Predicate. 
were riding 



Object. 



Subject 
Modifiers. 



A 



Predicate 
Modifiers. 



in an adjoining 
pond 



stately 

of snowy geese 

convoying whole 
fleets of ducks 



Other valuable exercises are practice in saying things in differ- 
ent ways : substitution of words, changing of phrases into 
clauses and the reverse, statement of contrary ideas, etc. 
These and many other excellent devices, for which the present 
work lacks space, may be. found in the various text-books for 
teaching composition. 

Most of the school rhetorics of a generation ago laid stress 
mainly upon the word and the sentence. But the importance 
of the paragraph as a basis of composition work paragraph 
seems now fully established. It is the unit of structure « 
thought in all that continuous thinking towards which the 
school is working. Whether the pupil attempt to grasp the 
thought of a story or of an explanation given by some one else, 
or to order his own thoughts into fit form for expression, his 
mind must proceed from paragraph to paragraph. When he 
wishes to make a single point clear, in any degree of fulness, 
he must write a paragraph. The appreciation of the paragraph, 
therefore, implies at once some power of discrimination and 
some sense of unity. 

Obviously, it cannot be taught in the primary grades. The 
very conception of it implies the ability to think of a unit of 
discourse larger than the sentence, of an integral part of the 
whole composition. When — and only when — the pupil has 
arrived at the power of giving a connected account long enough 



132 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

to be designated as a " whole composition," and is able to 
think of that account as made up of successive parts, he can 
begin to realize what the term " paragraph " means. The begin- 
nings of this study may be made, in very simple form, in the 
third or fourth grade. The pupil may be telling a story of 
some experience he has had. This story he can think of as 
made up of beginning, middle, and end : the circumstances, the 
principal event, and the consequences. His attention can be 
called to the similar building and paragraphing of some printed 
story. The way to the subject thus opened, the discrimination 
of the parts that compose a piece of writing and the noting of 
the essential elements in each of these parts should become a 
frequent exercise not only in the English lessons but in other 
school subjects. In his own writing he can learn to reject or 
postpone ideas for the sake of the paragraph unity. 

In this work constant references to good models are indis- 
pensable. To make the conception clear and firm is a work 
of time, — a work, indeed, which the school is hardly able to 
complete, for perfect paragraphing is an achievement for the 
thoroughly trained mind. None the less, it is to be worked 
for steadily in the elementary school. In this, as in all other 
forms of training, the school must seek and be contented with 
only approximations. 

As a form of composition for school use, the single paragraph 
has the special advantage of being short enough to be grasped 
easily, and long enough to comprise an adequate statement of 
an idea ; short enough, too, to be read easily by the overworked 
teacher, and long enough to indicate the pupil's mental proc- 
esses. It is better to write often and well than seldom and 
carelessly. It is better to attempt what one can grasp and 
" think through " than to fall into devious wanderings in the 
longer and more ambitious task. 

The discussion of paragraphs brings us naturally to the con- 
sideration of the plan of the whole composition. Should chil- 
Making ^ren nave a P^ an ? It has been objected that a 

Outlines. p] an ma ^ es the work stiff and mechanical, that it 

destroys interest and cripples imagination. The objection 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 1 33 

seems largely sentimental. It seems to assume that writing 
and speaking are emotional rather than intellectual processes, 
or that order and form hamper rather than facilitate the action 
of the mind. Now speech, though prompted by emotion, is 
essentially an intellectual act ; and teaching must bring order 
into intellectual activities. Moreover, that the following of a 
plan does not hamper intellectual activity is demonstrated by 
the daily experience of good teachers ; on the contrary, it 
gives a certain freedom and confidence to the pupil. Having 
made his rough outline, he writes what he knows upon the first 
topic and the second, etc., unhampered by the necessity of con- 
stantly considering where he " is going to come out." Outlin- 
ing the subject to be written is, like paragraph study, not in 
place in the earliest years. It may begin with the consideration 
of the paragraph ; it is, indeed, in the simpler forms of writing, 
the same thing, and may be presented in the same way. 

Perhaps the most valuable result of such work is the guid- 
ance it affords in "working up a subject," that is, either in 
taking stock of one's ideas or in gathering mate- Gathering 
rial. Children are generally helpless in both these Mat 6 * 1 * 1 - 
respects. Let us assume a case. A topic of some length is 
assigned for treatment, such as, say, The Building of the X. Y. Z. 
Railroad. Some information on the subject is already in 
possession of the pupils. Other information is to be sought 
in the appropriate places. The teacher begins to open up the 
subject by questions. When was the road built ? Where? 
Why? How long did it take? What were the difficulties? 
This and similar questions would result in the pupil's gathering 
a store of information which might be arranged in some such 
outline as follows : — 



The Building of the X. Y. Z. Railroad. 

I. Dates of beginning and completion. 

II. Reasons for building the railroad. 

i. Productiveness and populousness of the country through 
which it runs. 



134 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

2. Absence of other adequate means of transport, or ex- 
cessive charges of existing roads. 

3. Terminals opening up distant markets by connecting with 
other roads or with seaports. 

III. Obstacles to be overcome. 

1. Legislative : due to the prejudices or lack of foresight on 
the part of natives, or to influences brought to bear by rival 
roads. 

2. Financial : scarcity of capital ; lack of confidence in 
projectors. 

3. Natural : need of tunnelling, bridging, etc. 

4. These obstacles overcome by certain means. 

IV. Construction. 

1. Time. 

2. Cost. 

3. Influx to labourers, etc. 

V. Results. 

1. Stimulus to industry. 

2. Increase of population. 

3. Decrease of provincialism, etc. 

Such an outline is, perhaps, fuller and more elaborate than 
is desirable. It is given here, not as a model, but merely 
to indicate the possibilities of any outline as a guide in 
gathering and ordering ideas, and therefore of training in 
thinking. 

We now pass to the more general discussion of the prepara- 
tion for the composition. Such preliminary work as will guide 
Preparing tne stu dent in bringing to the surface of his con- 
for Writing, sciousness ideas which he already has, in gathering 
new ideas, and in arranging his material, is half the work of 
teaching composition. A barren mind makes good writing 
impossible. Either there will be no writing, or the meaning- 
less tautology which only stultifies and stupefies the writer. 
To avoid this condition, the ingenuity and alertness of the 
teacher's mind must be called into play. He must be able, first, 
to choose a subject that has possibilities; second, to turn it 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 1 35 

over in various lights, to place it in relation to other things, 

until the class has been brought to the point of finding it 

rich in material, and, finally, to stimulate that lively 

, -,. ...... , , , , . Gathering and 

oral discussion of it which adds both to interest Arranging 

and clearness. One phase of such preparatory 

work has been presented in the preceding paragraphs upon 

the making of outlines. 

Another phase is the presentation of good models. Much 
has been said about the use of good models. Some masters 
of style have given direct testimony and advice as Use of 
to their value. Johnson's famous admonition to Models « 
give one's days and nights to Addison, if one would acquire 
certain specific graces of style ; Franklin's testimony as to how 
he constantly imitated Addison in order to learn to write 
well ; and Stevenson's charming confession of " playing the 
sedulous ape " to various writers, are all well known. 1 But 
the distinction must be drawn between the kind of imitation 
thus recommended, and the kind appropriate for the average 
child in the elementary schools. These were men, or boys, of 
extraordinary gifts, possessing a power of analysis, an amount 
of enthusiasm, and a degree of sensitiveness not common. 
Their aim, moreover, was literary. Now the aim of school 
instruction cannot be to make authors. It must be content 
to teach boys and girls to write with a fair degree of clearness 
and propriety. The imitation of the fine graces of style is in- 
expedient and impossible ; it would only breed " fine writing," 
that is, fantastic and absurd writing. 

There is, however, a use for good models. They may be 
the best work of the members of the class, or the work of the 
teacher, or selections from good literature. They will serve : 
(1) To let the pupil see the sort of thing he has to do already 
done, and so get a general notion of what it is like, and the 
feeling that it can be done. (2) To give him certain general 



1 See Johnson's essay on Addison, in his Lives of the Poets, Franklin's 
Autobiography, and Stevenson's essay, " A College Magazine," in Mem- 
ories and Portraits. 



136 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

notions as to the order of procedure, — what to put first, etc. 
(3) To increase his vocabulary in the way that his vocabulary 
is naturally growing, that is, by contact with better and fuller 
speech than his own, and (4) To add to his stock of ideas. 
It should be noted here that the effects of good models are 
very different in the earlier and later stages of elementary in- 
struction. At first there is the merest unconscious imitation ; 
later, analysis of the content and form of literature, leading 
occasionally to conscious imitation. But such deliberate im- 
itations will be of infrequent occurrence and slight value, com- 
pared with the influences of the less studied sort in all the 
years of the elementary school. 

One of the topics magnified by much discussion in educa- 
tional conferences is " correlation of studies." Out of the 
Correlation heterogeneous materials making up an ordinary 
of studies. sc hool curriculum, it has seemed desirable to build 
some coherent, unified whole. Hence the attempts to bring 
the subjects of the course into right relations with each other, 
partly by placing them in certain parallel or consecutive places, 
partly by emphasizing certain phases of them as of value in 
this or that subject. English, being used in all the studies, 
has naturally been expected to supply a common bond among 
them. 

The predilections of the teacher or superintendent generally 
determine whether English is to be regarded as the handmaiden 
of all the other subjects, or the queen to whom they all bring 
tribute. So long as the relationship results in sound instruc- 
tion all along the line, it makes but little difference which 
point of view is adopted. It is enough that the teacher know 
and realize that the teaching of science and good, clear orderly 
English side by side is a desirable thing. To object because 
either the English or the science is regarded as of secondary 
value is like looking for grievances. As has been already 
pointed out, the fundamental aim should be the training of the 
mind in gaining clear ideas and expressing them clearly. 
Other subjects of the course will afford much good material for 
teaching composition. Lessons in history, science, manual 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 1 37 

training, will not only furnish the necessary ideas, but will also 
present the order in which those ideas are to be arranged ; 
that is, will supply both substance and form. Such use of 
material will also secure economy of time and energy. It is 
better for the history lesson that it should be gathered together 
and written in the orderly form of a good composition, and 
better for the composition lesson that it should be upon material 
already carefully worked over. 

Paradoxically enough, the most difficult of these relationships 
to define and employ in its full measure of value is that which 
at first seems easiest and most natural ; namely, the Literature and 
relationship between literature and composition. Composition. 
In the very excellence of the literary model lies the source of 
the difficulty. The indifferent model written by the teacher 
or by the pupils is easy to imitate ; but the simplest, the clear- 
est, — that is, the best, — of literary models are the despair 
precisely of those who can really appreciate them. The trouble 
lies in part in the nature of the challenge offered. Similar 
material may be told, indeed, in a somewhat similar manner ; 
but the peculiar something which makes the one perform- 
ance literature, and the imitations mere writing, eludes the 
grasp. We are reduced, therefore, to three obvious things in 
our attempt to correlate literature with composition: (1) To 
find in it our material for composition, as in the ordinary re- 
production of a story; (2) to follow the general plan pre- 
sented by the model ; 1 (3) to cultivate, by frequent and 
intimate contact with the best literature, a sense of the beauty 
of the form, which, in reason and justice, we can expect pupils 
to imitate only at a distance. That is to say, we are in no 
different case with respect to the first two of these things than 
when we deal with the material chosen from the text-books in 
history and science. With respect to the third thing, we have 
a task analogous to the inculcation of fine manners and good 
morals. We present the good models for imitation, we point 



1 See, for example, the order of the description in the opening scenes 
of Tennyson's Enoch Arden. 



138 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

out and iterate and enforce principles, but the subtle graces 
of character and bearing which are the desired result may 
or may not come. Much, very much, in either case de- 
pends upon the fineness of fibre of the teacher and the 
pupil. 

To surrender the whole problem, however, because of its 
subtlety and its difficulty would be mere cowardice. The views 
Suggestions J ust ex P resse d are to be regarded as a recognition 
as to Method. f its g enera i difficulty and its frequent insolu- 
bility. The road to its solution can at least be pointed 
out, and the achievement be left — where, after all presenta- 
tions of educational principles, it must always be left — for 
the wisdom, taste, and industry of the individual teacher. Sev- 
eral definite things may be done to bring the pupil towards 
this imitation of the best writing : (i) He may be led to sat- 
urate himself with it, by learning more and yet more of it. 
What he commits to memory, both ideas and diction, becomes 
part of his mental equipment. Every one knows how a knowl- 
edge of the English Bible has given dignity and weight to the 
speech even of the uneducated. (2) The pupil may be led 
to see the force of precise and simple diction. Such discrim- 
ination gives definiteness to his ideas and more clearness to 
his speech. A conscience for right speaking may and should 
be cultivated. (3) If the teacher admires the good things in 
language, and has the gift of showing such admiration in a 
genuine and temperate manner, the admiration is likely to be 
felt by the pupils. To remember good writing, to recognize 
its simplicity and precision, and to catch an admiration for it 
may not be enough to make good writers ; but they will make 
poor writers better writers. 

But can this be done with all pupils? Will they all see the 
beauty that we wish them to see? Probably not. It has 
become safe to say, without fear of being called brutal, that 
some children seem hopelessly dull, blind to beauty and to 
nice discriminations: that is, incapable of being educated. 
For these, the teacher must only do her best, provided she 
does not neglect the others. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 1 39 

In addition to the suggestions made in the foregoing para- 
graphs we must notice briefly the discussions in the school- 
room of books read by the class, leaving the fuller 
treatment of the topic for the section on the study Literature 
of literature. These discussions may include (1) ea " 
the statement of the story or ideas gleaned from the reading, 
(2) the expression of judgments upon these stories and ideas. 
Both are of the highest value. To repeat the author's ideas is 
to make them more thoroughly our own, and to adopt in some 
measure his vocabulary. To form and express judgments, 
even though they be crude, is to use one's mental stores in 
the way that makes them of most value : classifying ideas, 
gaining new ones by inference, and finding them more vivid 
as they issue in language. 

In a former chapter it has been argued that English is to 
be regarded as one subject, of which literature, composition, 
and language study are only the various aspects. English one 
Against this treatment of the subject there are cer- Sal)ject * 
tain arguments : (1) It is more difficult to maintain interest 
in the reading when digressions are made for the study of 
words and sentences. 1 (2) Time and energy are saved 
through the use of a text-book presenting principles well 
stated and examples well chosen. (3) There is danger that 
important linguistic facts and principles will be ignored or 
forgotten if left for incidental consideration in the reading- 
lessons. It is not easy for the most conscientious teacher to 
remember all the language work that needs to be taught, — 
or to judge wisely what should be taught, — while trying to 
teach well the literature that is read. (4) That the majority 
of teachers are not yet sufficiently trained either in subject 
matter or in the technique of their art to attempt such a 
method. 

In spite of these obvious objections, it seems that the vari- 
ous branches of the study of English should be brought into 



1 Mr. Chubb, in The Teaching of English, goes further in deprecating 
the use of the reading lesson as an opportunity for language study. 



V \ 

140 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATldN 

still nearer relationship. The teaching of these subjects only 
apart from the reading has certain grave objections, (i) It 
overlooks the importance of training in the habit of observ- 
ing the forms of words and sentences. Such observation is 

almost a necessary element in learning language, 
for and is a habit of most educated people. (2) It 

disregards the value of attention to the niceties of 
expression, upon which depend exact knowledge and fine appre- 
ciation. The isolated study of the meanings of words cannot 
leave in the pupil's mind so just an idea of their use as the 
study of their meaning in connected discourse ; and the study 
of sentences has more significance in connection with whole 
paragraphs. (3) It is, in itself, less interesting. Knowledge 
unrelated and unapplied, is dead knowledge to the child ; 
while knowledge of a word that helps to explain a sentence is 
living knowledge. 

In a given reading-lesson, say a poem like Longfellow's 
Paul Revere 's Ride, there might be several distinct aims in 
view. First, undoubtedly, the understanding of the story. 
After some brief preliminary explanation of the historical back- 
ground, or of terms and allusions not likely to be understood, 
the story would be read, and the reading be followed or ac- 
companied by such question or comment as seemed likely to 
sharpen impressions, point out relationships, or heighten the 
feelings aroused. Then or later (rules, must not be rigid about 
these things ; the tact of a wise teacher is more trustworthy 
than pedagogical theories) the language might be considered. 
Lines would be chosen to illustrate the points to be taught. 
Here the punctuation helps to indicate the meaning ; if 
changed, it would change the meaning thus and so. Here the 
word conveys such and such impression ; such another word, 
resembling this in meaning, would change the sense to so and 
so. Here will be noticed the short abrupt expression, leaving 
something to be supplied ; there the inverted order for the 
sake of emphasis, or, perhaps, of metre or rhyme ; and there 
the allusion or comparison with such and such associations. 
These and similar matters would naturally be elicited by skil- 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 141 

ful question and suggestion, inviting the co-operation of the 
child, rather than pointed out as matters of information by the 
teacher. 

To unify the work in language it will not always be neces- 
sary to begin with the reading. The study may begin with 
the language end of the matter, and find significant illustration 
in the reading. In either case the important end to be 
secured is that the pupils shall come to regard the studies in 
the mother-tongue as different phases of one subject, shall gain 
in the reading work illustrations of the facts of the language 
and an increasing power over the language ; and in the lan- 
guage study a means of interpreting and appreciating the 
reading. 

It would be well to regard the special text-books on language 
study as storehouses of facts and principles to be referred to 
when necessary and of exercises to be used when Language 
desirable. With suitable exercises and clear state- Test - Boofcs - 
ments of principles accessible, the emphasis could be thrown 
upon the language as found in the reading-books and as used 
by class and teacher. Care could be taken that important 
matters should not be overlooked, and that the language aspect 
of the work should heighten rather than diminish the interest 
in the content of the story. 

It remains to consider two questions that force themselves 
upon the attention of every conscientious teacher : How much 
and how often should pupils write ? And, how is Frequency 
the criticism of their work to be made most effec- o^Wrmen 1 
tive ? Several general principles may be offered in Work * 
answer to the first question : (1) Since writing, like speech and 
manners, is a habit, there should be at least daily practice in it. 
Such practice need not always be in set compositions. It may 
often be in the writing of some part of a school exercise in 
another subject. It should usually be short, but should be 
done with care. If the motor activities involved in writing 
are to be made easy and therefore serviceable, they must not 
be allowed to grow "rusty." (2) Since the mind, as it grows, 
becomes able to compass larger masses of material, there should 



142 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

be a gradual lengthening of the average exercises from the 
lower to the higher grades. 1 (3) Though the paragraph is 
the unit of discourse best adapted to the purposes of teach- 
ing composition, there should occasionally be longer com- 
positions, — from three to five hundred words, say, — in 
order that the pupil may gain the power of handling larger 
masses of material. Such exercises might occur once in two 
weeks. These considerations will have application in various 
ways according to the conditions under which the teacher 
works. If the class is twice as large as it ought to be, the 
teacher cannot be expected to keep the work up to an ideal 
standard. 

The second question, How shall written work be criticised ? 
is one of the most important in the whole problem of teaching 
Criticism of English. Upon the value of the criticism success 
Compositions. i n teaching composition finally depends. Two re- 
sults must be sought : economy of the teacher's time and energy, 
and effectiveness in the criticism made. Upon success in the 
Eff ti latter aim depends, in part, the securing of the 

former. How then shall the criticism be made 
effective? The aim of the work is to increase the pupil's 
knowledge of the subject, and to raise his standard of judg- 
ment ; in brief, to make him self-critical. The less neces- 
sary to him the teacher becomes, the better is the teaching. 
Hence the importance (1) of determining the ordinary errors 
and difficulties first to be attacked. Selecting these first 
points, make them the subject of class instruction, inviting 
criticism and discussion from the class as a whole. To go 
too fast is to discourage and confuse the pupils. (2) Present 
models of the thing well done ; make sure that the class is 
attentive. Require the doing of it in the right way, that it 
may become part of the motor activities. (3) Give help on 
the new difficulties, but hold the pupil responsible for things 



1 This principle applies equally to the oral composition, i. e. t the reci- 
tation. There should be topical recitations in which the pupil is called 
upon to discuss a subject without the prodding of the teacher's question. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 143 

that he ought to know. (4) Refuse to accept work that 
is below the standard which the pupil ought, by proper care, 
to be able to reach. Discriminate carefully between inability 
and slovenliness. Treat the latter as a grave fault. (5) 
Require the pupil to make corrections called for : in case of 
gross carelessness have the paper rewritten entire. (6) Assist 
him, by searching questions, to clear thinking. Obscure writ- 
ing is often due to the inability to think the subject out clearly. 
Have the class participate in such discussions. (7) Note 
individual difficulties ; treat these as far as possible in brief 
personal interviews. (8) Be as keen to commend good work 
as to reprove bad. Read specimens of good work to the class. 
(9) Let the criticism be constructive rather than destructive. 
Establish friendly and helpful relations with the class. To fail 
to do this is to cripple the work hopelessly. Writing is a very 
personal thing ; and right and kindly feeling between teacher 
and pupil is essential to the freedom and confidence that are 
necessary conditions to good expression. (10) Above all, keep 
a just balance between the critical and productive faculties of 
the child. To exaggerate the former is to inhibit his activity ; 
to over-stimulate the latter, is to cultivate carelessness. But if 
either must be in advance of the other, let it by all means be 
the latter. Carelessness may be corrected ; a rank and lux- 
urious growth may be pruned : but barrenness is a hopeless 
condition. 

So much for the criticism from the point of view of the 
pupil's welfare. How shall the teacher economize time and 

energy so as to do his duty, and yet escape the 

. r Economy* 

sanitarium or the insane asylum? Some of the 

suggestions here offered are, as will be observed, duplications 
of what has been said above. (1) Attack a few difficulties at 
a time, and let those be typical : concentrate the attention 
upon things that may be learned until they are learned. Un- 
der even the best conditions these things will often be forgotten. 
But reduce the repetition of instruction to a minimum. (2) Use 
symbols in red ink or blue pencil along the margin, calling at- 
tention to errors which the pupil can correct. (3) Have the 



144 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

corrections made by the pupil, then read the compositions 
again. The second reading is easy, and is the only means of 
insuring the performance of the work. The original work of 
correcting is generally wasted, unless made completely effec- 
tive by the second revision. (4) Make the criticism of im- 
portant matters a co-operative class lesson. (5) Reject all 
slovenly work. (6) Do not attempt to read all papers to 
the sacrifice of a clear head and steady nerves. Both 
teacher and class are losers under such conditions. Select, 
rather, a group of papers from the lot, and make these 
the subject of the criticism with the class. The teacher's obli- 
gations are serious; but they do not extend to martyrdom 
for rich cities that consider education cheap. (7) Aim to 
stimulate the interest of the children, and to promote as 
rapidly as possible their own powers of independent self-criti- 
cism. (8) Reserve time and energy enough to keep alive 
mentally by the reading that both instructs and relaxes. 
Freshness of mind is essential. Critical work involves diffi- 
cult constructive processes. It means the ability to realize 
the possibilities of the subject upon which the pupil has writ- 
ten, to take into account his powers, and by considering these 
two things, to decide where he has reached the proper level 
and where fallen short. It means reading not merely for the 
spelling and the grammar — such criticism is unworthy of the 
name — but for the ideas. How then can it be done by a 
starved and jaded mind ? 

VI. English Grammar in the Elementary Schools 

The general subject of the teaching of English grammar 
is somewhat fully discussed later in this volume. 1 The pur- 
pose of the present section is to set forth some of the prin- 
ciples and methods that apply more specifically to the treat- 
ment of the subject in the upper grades of the elementary 
school. 



l See Chapter III. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 1 45 

As is well known, there was for many years a reaction against 
the study of English grammar. 1 This reaction seems to have 
been the result of several causes : (i) The instruc- Reaction 
tion was begun too early, and was therefore both Urmai 
meaningless and over- difficult ; (2) The treatment Grammar. 
was made mechanical to the point of degenerating into mere 
rote-work ; (3) There was a growing recognition that much of 
the subject was not in reality English grammar at all, but 
Latin grammar badly fitted to the English; 2 (4) The claim 
commonly made for the study, that it led to the correct use of 
English, was entirely contradicted by facts, since many good 
students of grammar used bad English, and many who knew 
no grammar used good English. 

Now, every one of these grave objections has been fully 
sustained. And yet the subject of English grammar holds a 
place in the schools, defended both by the practi- 3ts 
cal teacher and by the theorist upon education. Justification. 
The ground of the teacher's faith lies in his actual knowledge 
of the value of grammar (1) as a general means of training in 
clear thinking, (2) as an assistance in understanding language 
and in clear expression, and (3) as a means of correction of 
some of the gross errors of speech. The theoretical defences 
are along the same lines. Says Professor Laurie : 8 " By the 
analysis of language, then, you introduce the young intellect 
to the unconscious analysis of its own thinking in its whole 
range. While engaged in this exercise, the abstract powers 
are so involved in a concrete that is familiar to all that the 
formal discipline is not made obtrusive and distasteful. A boy 
who is intelligently analyzing language is analyzing the proc- 
esses of thought, and is a logician without knowing it. And 
this is the reason why the study of language in its formal as- 
pects has always been regarded as the best preparation for the 



1 See, for example, Matthew Arnold's Reports on Elementary Schools 
for 1861, New York, 1889. 

2 See Barbour's The Teaching of English Grammar, p. 4, and Goold 
Brown's Grammar of Grammars, second d., p. 130. 

8 Language and Linguistic Method, Lecture I. 

10 



146 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

logician and philosopher, and, according to Quintilian, of the 
orator also. Hence, too, it is the best preparation for the study 
of all or any of the sciences." l " Grammar, as the logic of 
common speech, is a system of abstractions." * " It is ap- 
parent from the nature of an examination of a sentence of 
English, with a view to the thorough understanding of it, . . . 
that the pupil who fully comprehends it, has already analyzed 
words and clauses in relation to thought, and performed an 
important analytico-synthetic exercise." 2 A similar defence 
of the study of grammar is offered in the well-known and able 
Report of the Committee of Fifteen, and has been made in 
many other places. 3 As a matter of fact, then, the belief in 
the value of grammar is not seriously shaken. What has been 
overthrown is only the mistaken notions as to the nature of the 
subject, and of the value to be derived from the study of it. 
The net result of modern thought upon its value may be thus 
summed up : (1) It is a training in thought ; (2) it is of value 
in interpreting sentences and in clear expression ; (3) it 
is a guide in correct expression and in certain matters of 
usage; (4) it is an assistance in acquiring foreign languages. 
The most important of these functions is undoubtedly the 
first. 

The task of teaching grammar to young pupils is not easy. 
Its abstract nature repels, and its distinctions are 

S Ti j? C6 s ti n s 

for Teaching sometimes difficult There, are certain problems 
which arise in the work for the solution of which 

the following suggestions are offered : — 

1. It is well to postpone the systematic treatment of formal 

grammar until the seventh year in school. It has been taught 

When to earlier, of course ; but the immaturity of the pupil, 

not yet arrived at the stage of development where 

the powers of abstraction are active, makes the work arduous 



1 Language and Linguistic Method, Lecture VI. 

2 Ibid., Lecture VII. 

8 See Barbour's The Teaching of English Grammar, pp. 22-24, for a 
list of such citations. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 1 47 

and distasteful, if not futile : what seems to be learned may 
not really be known at all except as a series of words. More- 
over, it has been found perfectly possible to give all the gram- 
mar needed in two years, or even in one year, before the pupil 
enters the high school. 

2. It is very desirable that some of the elementary concep- 
tions of grammar be taught early in the course, beginning not 
later than the fourth year, and gradually increasing preliminary 
the stock of grammatical knowledge until the sub- sta & es « 
ject is taken up as a systematic study. Beginning with the 
simple distinction between subject and predicate, make this 
clear by numerous examples. Then teach nouns and pro- 
nouns as names of things and persons ; then verbs, as the 
words that are necessary to a statement, or assertion. These 
must be made clear by numerous examples, by frequent repe- 
tition. Then, in similar manner, develop the ideas of adjective 
and adverb, — that is, of modifiers of noun (or pronoun) and 
verb, respectively, — making the conception include not only 
the individual word, but the groups of words that have these 
functions. Make the work real and vital by keeping it 
in the most intimate connection with the general study of 
language ; use it in composition and in the interpretation 
of things read and studied. If this body of knowledge be 
acquired and made familiar through use by the end of the 
sixth year, the study of formal grammar may be taken up 
in the seventh year without fear of too great difficulty, and, 
it is to be hoped, with sufficient interest on the part of the 
pupil. 

3. From the first consideration of the parts of speech, throw 

the emphasis upon function as determining the class to which 

the words belong. To say that such and such a . _ . 
J Emphasis 

word is a noun used as a verb, or an adjective SP " 

' . J Function. 

used as a noun, is a needless confusion of terms 
and ideas. In English, the word is what its use in the partic- 
ular context makes it. Only by keeping this in mind can 
we get the desired attention upon the logical aspect of 
grammar. 



148 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

4. The work must be made concrete. Abstract conceptions 
are meaningless unless linked with the power to render them 

concrete. Failure in this makes vagueness, parrot- 
like iteration, and all the faults of merely formal 
instruction from which modern education is still freeing itself. 
Keep principles and examples close together. Start by prefer- 
ence with the example, and make it clear that the rule or the 
definition is only the formula, the description, and not the real 
thing. It is easier, for instance, to make clear the essential 
nature of prepositions and conjunctions by lists of them in use 
than by definitions. Indeed, a facility in rule and definition 
should be a warning to the teacher to test the reality of the 
pupil's knowledge. 

5. There must be frequent repetition. Abstract ideas easily 

evaporate unless they are made part of the very stuff of the 

mind ; and they become so incorporated not 
Repetition. , , . . . . , , 

merely by explanation and example, but by long 

familiarity and frequent application. An illustration familiar 
to teachers of mathematics is the notion of general quantity 
as represented by letters in algebra : it usually comes to be ac- 
cepted as an ordinary and rational conception only after it is 
familiar; until that stage is reached, explanation, though it 
may allay doubts and win assent, is inadequate to make the 
conception real. 

6. The order of procedure indicated above, that is, from 
the sentence to the word, seems to be easiest for elementary 
order of pupils, though unquestionably they may be taught 
Treatment. successfully by the opposite order. The following 
sequence of topics, or its near equivalent, is finding its way into 
text-books and into many schools : — 

A. Structure of the Sentence 

I. A general analysis of the simple sentence into subject 

and predicate. 
II. Adjective modifiers : words, or groups of words. 
III. Adverbial modifiers : words, or groups of words. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 1 49 

B. Parts of Speech 

I. Nouns, pronouns, adjectives (including articles). 
II. Verbs, adverbs. 
III. Conjunctions, prepositions, interjections. 

C. Parsing 

I. Numbers, genders, and cases of nouns and pronouns; 

inflections ; kinds of nouns. 
II. Comparison of adjectives and adverbs ; inflections ; 
kinds of each. 

III. Verbs : voice, mood ; inflections ; verb phrases ; kinds 

of verbs ; participles. 

IV. Prepositions, conjunctions, interjections ; their relation- 

ships. 

D. Analysis 

I. Phrases and clauses : kinds and uses. 
II. Analysis of sentences : complex and compound. 

Now, it is obvious that this order of procedure presents 
difficulties. So do all orders of procedure known to teachers 
of grammar. That which is open to least logical objection 
is the old-fashioned order, from words to sentences. But the 
logical order of a subject is by no means always the natural or 
easy order of acquisition. And in spite of its apparent lack 
of system, an order in general like the above is more easily 
followed by the mind of the child. 

7. The subjects of diagrams and parsing are fully discussed 
elsewhere. 1 The general principles there laid down seem to 
apply with equal force in the present chapter. It p ars i ng a^ 
should be noted, especially, that in the elementary Diagrams. 
school, as in the high school, the analysis of the sentence — 
that is, the analysis of thought — is the most valuable exercise 
in connection with the study of grammar. 



1 See Chapter III. 



150 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

8. A more difficult question to determine than either the 
order of procedure or the importance of parsing and analysis 
How much * s > ^ nat an d how much grammar should there be 
Grammar? m tne elementary school ? The high school teacher 
wants the subject finished in the elementary school, so that he 
may have no further annoyance from it. But this is hardly 
possible, inasmuch as some of the distinctions of grammar 
cannot be taught with advantage until the pupil is older 
and has learned some of the grammar of other languages. 
Moreover, the teacher of English in the high school who at- 
tempts to present English as " one subject " can hardly ignore 
formal grammar. The teachers of Latin and German, also, 
would have the subject completed before the high school, 
partly that they may build upon certain definite conceptions 
that they have a right to expect, and partly that they may 
escape the teaching of certain grammatical facts which it is 
their business to teach. Unfortunately, too, their own unfamil- 
iarity with modern English grammar often leads them to ex- 
pect of the pupil a kind of grammar which is not English, but 
Latin. The body of grammatical facts appropriate to the ele- 
mentary school is rather limited. It might be summed up 
about as follows : — 



I. A knowledge of the sentence sufficient to analyze and 
parse it down to its single words, except, of course, in the case 
of phrases that are so idiomatic that they render analysis 
absurd. 

II. An understanding of case and a knowledge of case 
relationships including not only the nominative, genitive, 
and objective (or accusative), but also the dative and the 
vocative. 

III. An acquaintance with the verb in its various aspects 
of voice, mood, tense ; transitive and intransitive participles 
and their uses. 

IV. A knowledge of all the common inflections as they 
appear in nouns, pronouns, adjectives, verbs, and adverbs. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 151 

V. The various kinds of nouns, pronouns, adjectives, ad- 
verbs, and conjunctions. 

VI. The simple rules of syntax, particularly those whose 
violation is common in oral speech. 

VII. The power to distinguish between relationships where 
the form may be the same but the meaning twofold, as in 
phrases like "the love of God." 

VIII. A brief general history of the language, as to its 
origin ; some of the historical facts that throw light on present 
forms, like the genitive and dative cases, the verb phrases, etc. 

9. The choice of a text-book is an important matter. 
Its order of presentation of the subject is not all-important; 
for that need not be followed rigidly. But clear- q^^^ 
ness of statement, aptness, interest, and sufficiency Text-books, 
of examples are points of great consequence. The com- 
ments of Professor Sweet, though made with reference to the 
study of a foreign language, 1 are also applicable here : " A 
good example must fulfil two conditions : (1) It must illustrate 
and confirm the rule unambiguously ... (2) The example 
must be intelligible as it stands, without further context." The 
examples ought, further, to be taken from good literature, 
either from modern writers, or, if from older writers, from 
among those sentences whose " construction has been imitated 
by modern writers." 2 

10. The correction of false syntax as a grammatical exer- 
cise has been vigorously assailed. Certainly it has sometimes 
been far from justifiable. But we believe such _. 
exercises may have their uses. When the right Syntax, 
form is once learned, occasional practice in setting the wrong 
right has the advantage of sharpening the critical faculties and 
deepening the memory of the right forms. Such errors as 
are used for the purpose should, however, not be arbitrary 
inventions of the teacher or author ; they should be errors 



1 Sweet's Practical Study of Languages, pp. 131 ff. 

2 Ibid., p. 134. 



152 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

which are actually made in the oral or written speech of the class, 
or errors to which they are exposed by their environment. 

ii. Since the point of view in modern English grammar as 
presented by English philologists is radically different from 
that given in the old-fashioned grammar, and in many gram- 
mars still in use in the schools, it is the duty of every teacher 
of grammar to make himself acquainted with the modern 
point of view. 

VII. Spelling 

So long as English remains a badly spelled language, — that 
is, a language whose sounds are imperfectly and irregularly 
represented by its orthography, — so long will the 
task of learning to spell remain severe. Spelling 
was at one time, if not a matter of individual taste, at least 
a matter in which individual variations from an imperfectly 
established standard were lightly judged. With the wider 
diffusion of common instruction, and the prevalence of the 
ideal of "correctness" in English, correct spelling came to be 
a test of education, and with most people is so at the present 
day. When the school subjects were few, to learn to spell 
was a difficult task to which were devoted many hours of con- 
ning and reciting ; now that the curriculum contains so much 
that economy of time must be sought, English spelling has 
become a serious burden. 

Remedial measures have of course been suggested. The 
spelling reformers have offered changes more or less radical 
Suggested anc ^ more or ^ ess rational. These have won but 
Remedies. slight favour. The new forms look so strange ; our 
habits and our tastes are bound up with the old forms. And so, 
though most of us are in theory in favour of reform, the weight 
of custom and of vested interests has made the progress of 
reform very slow. We are beginning to write program without 
the final me, and to adopt a number of similar minor changes ; 
but it is likely to be long before any thorough change is 
effected. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 153 

The educationists have, of course, offered their theories. 
Time spent in spelling-drill is wasted, they have said. Pupils 
who learn to read by the " word method " or the " sentence 
method " will learn to spell because they will see how the 
words look. This was a beautiful theory. But its failure 
in practice was so complete and final that it brought dis- 
credit even upon many of the best principles in the " new 
education." 

The present situation, then, is something like this : English 
spelling is irrational and difficult, and likely to remain so for 
all the generations in sight ; there is a widespread The p,^^ 
and settled tendency to judge of a man's intel- Situation. 
lectual capacity by his ability to spell; the elementary cur- 
riculum is so crowded that time is precious; and we have 
discovered no royal road to spelling. Some things have, 
however, been discovered, that point out the path of present 
effort. 

1. Special drill seems necessary. More than an hour and 
a half per week of drill seems not to be attended with a com- 
mensurate increase in results. Less than this seems insufficient 
to produce " good spellers." 1 

2. There is a decided difference in native aptitudes for the 
work. To some it is comparatively easy, to others a well-nigh 
hopeless task. Moreover, it has been discovered that the 
ability to spell seems to " run in families," that is, to be 
hereditary. 2 

3. Some people spell " by ear," but most of them by the 
eye ; that is, they have a memory of the word as it appears on 
the printed page. To these forms of memory must be added 



1 See J. M. Rice, "The Futility of the Spelling Grind," Forum, 
XXIII. 163 ff. (April, 1897) and 409 ff. (June, 1897). 

2 This has been established in some studies recently conducted under 
the direction of Professor E. L. Thorndike of Teachers College. The 
same conclusions were arrived at independently by Professor F. N. 
Scott, and were presented by him before the Massachusetts Association 
of Teachers of English in November, 1901. See the New York 
Evening Post, November 16, 1901, p. 12. 



154 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

the motor memories whereby the hand automatically writes the 
word that is in the mind. 

Now it is obvious that it is the ability, not to spell the word 
orally, but to write it, that is desired. The spelling-lessons 
General should, therefore, be mainly written. They should 

Suggestions, occasionally have the reinforcement of oral les- 
sons, partly for the benefit of those whose auditory memories 
are stronger, partly for the sake of the emulation thus easily 
aroused, 1 and partly for the better appreciation of the word as 
an audible thing. Many words are misspelled because they 
are never correctly heard. The two main objects for which 
to strive are, however, a clear picture of the word as it looks 
on the page, and a readiness in transcribing this visual image 
with the pen. For this purpose the teacher will lay stress 
upon the memory of the appearance of the word ; will call for 
its reproduction orally, and in writing after it has been seen on 
the page or the blackboard ; will urge the pupils consciously 
to get and hold the image of the word ; and will be careful 
that new words are not merely heard but also seen in writing 
or in print. 

Rules in spelling are good things if well used. The rule is 
not the point from which to start. But when a number of 
The Use instances under the rule are known, the rule serves 

of Rules. t0 k ]d t h e principle in mind : such are the rules 

for the ei and ie combination, for the doubling of the final 
consonant when a suffix is added, and the like. 2 

In a language whose orthography has so little regularity, 
whatever of uniformity there is should be seized upon and 
turned to account : hence the value of learning lists of words 
of analogous form, like those ending in Hon, sion, cious, etc. 
These are more easily remembered if recalled as belonging to 
a certain group. Finally, most pupils need to realize that 
they are expected to learn to spell fairly well, and that to do 



1 The author wishes to put himself on record as a believer in an 
occasional "spelling-match" of the antique sort. 

2 See the Introductions to the dictionaries for lists of such rules. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 1 55 

this they must work. The teacher can do little to help them : 
if they are not to carry through life a habit of bad spelling as 
a badge of illiteracy, they must save themselves by a lively 
conscience, and a confirmed habit of being concerned about 
words. 

VIII. Literature in the Elementary Schools 

Since the days when, a generation ago, the literature intro- 
duced in the common schools was generally limited to the 
series of school readers, and the selections learned literature 
for the Friday afternoon " declamation " exercises, guSject^its 
the theory of instruction in literature has been dis- Permanence. 
cussed from almost every conceivable point of view. As a 
revelation of beauty, as a source of pleasure, as a means of 
introduction to the past, as a revelation to himself of the per- 
sonality of the pupil, 1 as a study of life, as systematic discipline, 
or as a cultivation of the imagination — from these and other 
points of view the study of literature in the elementary schools 
has been amply advocated. To enter at this date upon any 
justification of its place seems useless. Literature is in the 
schools by universal consent, and is as likely to stay there as 
any other subject. The accepted view of the elementary 
school as the introduction to the environment of the pupils 
insures the permanence of literature in the curriculum. For 
the sake, however, of a proper basis in discussing the treat- 
ment of the subject, it is needful to formulate our judgments 
upon its educational worth, its relation to other subjects of the 
school curriculum, and the best methods of teaching it. 

By literature, we mean not the made-to-order reading matter 
furnishing graduated series of words for beginners, nor the 
moral lessons whose sole excuse is their doubtful The Test 
effect in securing right conduct, nor the " informa- literature 
tion " lessons that aim to unify the course of study. 
We mean rather that select body of prose and poetry which the 
world of cultivated men and women, untroubled by educational 



1 See Corson's Aims of Literary Study, pp. 7-23. 



156 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

theories, is willing to call literature. Its range is from Mother 
Goose to Plato ; but wherever it may lie between these limits, 
to be literature it must have also another stamp of approval 
than that of the schoolmaster. To define it is the business 
of criticism and aesthetics ; to be at home in it is the teacher's 
duty. 

For thousands of years letters have been regarded as the 
chief — sometimes as the only — source of true culture. 
I ts Greek and Roman education proceeded largely 

Importance* upon this assumption. 1 Chinese education still 
Historically. rec ognizes little else. 2 Mediaeval literature is full 
of the same idea. The Renaissance, bringing together the 
literary achievements of the elder world and the best con- 
temporary thought and feeling, expressed its intellectual life 
best in literature ; and to be '• lettered " was the only way to 
be educated. The study of humanity through literature was 
the only true " humanism." How the Renaissance degener- 
ated into the formal classicism of the early eighteenth century, 
how this formalism was broken down by another intellectual 
and spiritual revival of western Europe, until literature came 
again to fuller expression of the human spirit, are matters of 
familiar history. Through it all, however, it was still the 
literary ideal, in whatever form, that dominated education. 3 
By the middle of the nineteenth century the educational 
fastnesses were rudely assailed from an unexpected quarter. 
The great achievements of physical science demanded rec- 
ognition. They had established new facts, not only regard- 
ing nature but regarding man, which altered the whole view 
of life. They had proved the validity of scientific method 
not only as an organon of knowledge but as a means of 



1 See Monroe's Source Book of the History of Education, New York, 
1901. 

2 See A. H. Smith's Village Life in China, pp. no ff., New York, 
1900. 

3 That comparatively little of this found its way meanwhile into the 
elementary schools is evidence only of the failure to realize the pos- 
sibilities of early instruction. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 157 

discipline. And then followed the great educational con- 
troversy of the sciences versus letters. 1 The scientists won 
their case, except in their claim that science satisfied all the 
requirements of a liberal education. 2 The upshot of the con- 
troversy is that both literature and physical science reveal to 
us phases of our environment ; both train the mind by furnish- 
ing material for the apprehension and the judgment; both 
develop the imagination and discipline the reasoning faculties. 
Science, however, makes the larger appeal to the reason, and 
literature to the emotions. Careful thinkers in both fields 
have gone further and pointed out that the mental processes 
involved in literature and science are the same : a generaliza- 
tion and classification of experiences, in the one case ex- 
pressing the results in concrete representation of the type, 
in the other stating them abstractly in the law or the formula. 3 
Still another important subject has, within our own generation, 
entered the schools in the manual arts, which train not only 
the perceptions and the judgment, but the muscles and the 
will, and, like science and literature, help to make the pupil 
acquainted with his environment. When to these branches 
of human knowledge we add history, whose educational value 
is in most essential points identical with that of literature, we 
have in broad outlines the scope of elementary instruction. 

From the foregoing survey it is evident that while the 
educational importance of literature as a subject of elementary 
instruction is far better recognized than formerly, it has no 
such pre-eminence as it once held in college and university 
instruction. Nor is it the purpose of the present discussion 
to claim for the subject any such pre-eminence, but rather to 
show what its educational value really is, and how this value 
may be realized. 



1 See Huxley's Science and Education, New York, 1894, for a strong 
and interesting presentation of the scientific side. 

2 See the excellent essay on " Literature and Science " in Matthew 
Arnold's Discourses in America. 

3 Woodberry's Heart of Man, pp. 82-94, New York, 1900, and Karl 
Pearson's Grammar of Science, pp, 34-36, London, 1900. 



158 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

Literature portrays human life, its activities, its ideas and 

emotions, and those things about which human interest and 

emotion cluster. 1 It presents them in forms which 
Literature as r . , , . T , , 

a Portrayal are of themselves pleasing. It does not, however, 

rest with mere portrayal, but presents its pictures 
and ideas in such manner and such relations as to give them 
a new interest, a new meaning : it colours them with emotion 
and interprets their significance. It gives the personal point 
of view of the author, that is, his memories and the combina- 
tions he has made of them, with the resultant inferences and 
emotions ; 2 but, to be literature of the highest order, this 
point' of view must also be such as to be accepted by the 
world as true in essence. 3 Literature is therefore a presenta- 
tion and interpretation of life, — a "criticism of life," is 
Matthew Arnold's well-known phrase, — and, as such, must be 
of the highest value in acquainting the young with life as it is 
in its more permanent and universal aspects, and with the 
judgments upon it, the interpretations of it, and the emotional 
colouring given to it by writers of wide knowledge, deep insight, 
and right feeling. 4 

There is an ancient objection to literature, — ancient and, 
though often answered, constantly recurring, — that it pre- 

. , sents life in an over-drawn, fantastic, and exagger- 
Essential ' .' && 

Truth of ated manner. Aristotle answered it in part, and the 

Literature. 

answer has been repeated, amplified, and added to. 5 

It must, however, be admitted that what untrained minds get 



1 See the introductory chapter to Palgrave's Landscape in Poetry, 
New York, 1897. 

2 See La Farge's Considerations on Painting, Lecture II., New York, 
1895, and W. H. Mallock, " Relation of Art to Truth," Forum, IX. 36 ff. 

3 Shelley's Defence of Poetry and Woodberry's " A New Defence 
of Poetry " in Heart of Man. 

4 Ruskin's Sesame and Lilies is a familiar and interesting presenta- 
tion of these points of view. 

6 See Butcher's Aristotle's Theory of Poetry and Fine Art, Chapter 
III., London and New York, 1898; Sidney's Defence of Poesie ; Shelley, 
Mallock and Woodberry, cited above. Gayley and Scott's Literary 
Criticis7n, Boston, 1899, is a bibliography to the whole range of this and 
other topics of criticism. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 1 59 

from a book is often the exaggerated and impossible part, 
while the underlying truth, the universal, eludes them ; that 
their interest is mainly in action, and very little in a "philos- 
ophy of life." Their judgment of values in the world of 
literature is, as in everything else, childish. They do not 
know the difference between wisdom and folly, between common 
sense and balderdash, between courage and braggadocio, 
between beauty and tinsel. This is far from being an argu- 
ment against the truthfulness of good literature. If it has any 
bearing on the matter at all, it is, a fortiori, merely an evidence 
of the need of the sound and wholesome. Cultivated minds 
find in literature (and history) the most real and faithful 
presentation of life : they see that they are wiser in the realm 
of the human spirit for reading it. 1 And this wisdom lies in 
well-chosen and thoughtful reading, for whoever has the 
patience and the capacity. Lowell has said all this and much 
more in one of his inimitable essays : " But have you ever 
rightly considered what the mere ability to read means? That 
it is the key which admits us to the whole world of thought 
and fancy and imagination? to the company of saint and 
sage, of the wisest and wittiest at their wisest and wittiest 
moment? That it enables us to see with the keenest eyes, 
hear with the finest ears, and listen to the sweetest voices of 
all time?" 2 The case is well summed up by Commissioner 
Harris : 3 " All that man does contributes to a revelation of 
human life in its entirety, but art and literature lead all other 
branches of human learning in their capacity to manifest and 
illustrate the desires and aspirations, the thoughts and deeds 



1 Some most interesting collections of the praises of books have been 
made. Among them are Frederic Harrison's Choice of Books, London, 
1886, New York, 1895; Ireland's Book-Lover's Enchiridion, London, 
1884 ; C. F. Richardson's Choice of Books, Balfour's Pleasures of Reading, 
London, 1888 ; Baldwin's Book-Lover, Chicago, 1892 ; Farrar's Great 
Books, New York, 1898. 

2 Lowell's Books and Libraries, 

3 » why Art and Literature Ought to be Studied in Elementary 
Schools," by W. T. Harris, Educational Review, XIII. 325, April, 
1897. 



160 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

of mankind. Hence the educational value of these things. 
In the presence of the conflict of moral ideas, the struggle of 
passion against what is rational, the attacks of sin and crime 
on the divine order of the world, all that is deepest in human 
character is manifested. Art and literature portray these 
serious collisions, and like the mountain upheavals that break 
and tilt up the strata of the crust of the earth and reveal to 
the geologist the sequence of the formations from the most 
primitive to the most recent, so these artistic situations reveal 
to all men the successive strata in the evolution of human 
emotions, ideas, and actions. Thereby the single individual 
comes to know the springs of action of his fellow-men." The 
objection that mere knowledge of books does not bring knowl- 
edge of life must be admitted. Other experience, contact 
with life in other ways, is also necessary. But it is just such 
an arrangement that modern education desires, and not a 
monastic seclusion in the world of books. 

Next to the knowledge of human nature and of life, we seek 
in literature a means of training. The mind grows by acquir- 
Mental * n & ideas, by the exercise of memory and judgment. 

Training. Literature, containing material interesting of itself, 
and ordered in a way that the immature mind can follow, is 
one of the best means of promoting such growth. It widens 
the intellectual horizon, and places the elements that make up 
human life in just and illuminating relationships ; but more 
than this, it presents those concepts and interests which, far 
more than the concepts of science and mathematics, are the 
habitual and essential subjects of human thought. 

In Matthew Arnold's essay already cited * there is a clear 

and vigorous insistence on two important elements 
Plcssurc. 

in our nature which are satisfied by literature : the 

sense of beauty and the sense of conduct. Most children have 
a sense of beauty ; it would be rash to say that all do. Liter- 
ature, particularly stories, is one of the earliest pleasures that 
they find when they begin to come into possession of an intel- 



1 Literature and Science. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION l6l 

lectual kingdom. We hear much of the pleasures of reading. A 
very little analysis of the phrase shows that they are of many 
kinds. There is the pleasure that comes from the normal func- 
tioning of our minds, the pleasure of mere mental activity \ the 
pleasure that arises from the sense of power or the acquisition 
of knowledge ; the pleasure in beauty of picture or in exquisite 
phrasing ; the pleasure in high ideals inspiring generous emo- 
tions, etc. All of these pleasures are present more or less to the 
child in his reading, but none of them quite so much as the 
delight of entering into a world of beauty, a world of the imagi- 
nation, henceforth his own world. In Tennyson's A Dream of 
Fair Women and Recollections of the Arabian Nights, in 
Keats's sonnet On First Looking into Chapman's Homer, we 
have two poets' records of what such pleasure meant to them. 
Though it means less to the less gifted, its value is never to 
be ignored. It is an overstrenuous view of life and education 
which depreciates pure pleasure of any sort. The beauty of 
the world of " once upon a time," where nothing was wrong — 
or, if wrong, was picturesquely so and spectacularly punished 
— where something was always happening, where the skies 
were always blue and the woods were always green, is, it may 
be, an elementary type of beauty. But it pleases the child 
and helps to develop his taste. His admiration, if properly 
fed, grows until it takes in higher forms of beauty, passing 
easily and gradually from the simple to the higher aesthetic 
pleasures. 

It is, we believe, idle to claim that all pupils can be brought 
to these higher artistic pleasures. Nature has put up the 
barriers against many of them. But it is the business of the 
school to proceed as if these barriers were not ; to bring 
before the children the best literature they can understand. 
To " foster the sense of beauty," the source of some of our 
highest pleasures, and a safeguard against many of the lowest 
pleasures, is one of the cardinal duties of the elementary 
school. 

The third function of literature as a school subject is the 
cultivation of the moral sense, " the sense of conduct." On 

ii 



l62 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

this subject it is easy to go too far; easy to forget the fre- 
quent gap between aesthetic and intellectual development on 

-^. ,,, „ the one hand, and the will to do right on the other. 
Ethical Value. ' to 

Many of the pleas for literature as moral salvation 
seem purely sentimental. But that some of the elements of 
good literature make for morality is beyond the shadow of a 
doubt. 

(i) Literature supplies " the expulsive power of a higher 
emotion." The mind filled with the beautiful ideals of literature 
is less open to the sordid temptation of gain, to the pettiness 
of spite and gossip, to the seductions of sensuality. Every 
mind will have its treasure-house of pleasant images. It is 
well for the child if they be of such materials as are supplied 
by Irving, Scott, Tennyson, and Stevenson. At a certain stage 
of development, generally between twelve and sixteen, the en- 
largement of the imagination through reading goes on very 
rapidly. The inner life expands as in no period since infancy. 
The importance of the elements that enter into this expansion, 
coincident as it is with the growth into manhood and woman- 
hood, can hardly be overestimated. 1 

(2) In addition to this, good literature supplies good ideals 
of conduct, — makes the good attractive and the base ugly. 
Imitation is the strongest impulse to action in childhood, and 
admiration is the strongest incentive to imitation. How readily 
children, especially those who have good imaginations and 
are therefore most subject to enticement and most worth 
saving, imitate their favourite heroes, is well known. A good 
story is worth a dozen good precepts. The immediate power 
of a right ideal well presented in a story has often been 
shown. 2 



1 A series of interesting investigations made by Professor J. E. Russell 
revealed the fact that at this period the increase in the reading habit was 
extremely rapid ; and that where good literature was not obtainable, 
boys and girls read not only stuff that was worthless from its vacuity, but 
much that was positively and dangerously bad. 

2 The Romans knew the full value of this ; hence their use of heroic 
traditions. See Monroe's Source Book of the History of Education. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 1 63 

(3) While our modern philosophy may not accept the 
Socratic doctrine that to know right is to do right, it is unde- 
niable that right knowing is necessary to right doing, and that 
just views " make for righteousness." Now, good literature, 
as we have already shown, seeks to present the phenomena of 
life in just and true relations. To come to know good litera- 
ture is to see truly and fairly ; to get beyond and outside of 
one's narrow personal point of view, and see. things as they 
are to all men. Such an attitude cannot fail to increase respect 
for the rights of others. 

(4) The emotional element of literature lies close to the 
springs of conduct. The clenched hand, the sigh, the tear, that 
the story calls forth are due to the same emotion that prompts 
the generous action. The results in conduct are various. 1 The 
boy may start to fight the Indians ; the sentimental girl may weep 
over the troubles of a fictitious heroine and leave the house- 
hold duties to her mother ; and the thoughtful reader may be 
led to speak a kindlier word, or interfere in some case of op- 
pression or brutality. The emotion unexpressed in action, we 
are told, tends to weaken the fibre of character, to enervate 
the will. Is not this one of the specious half-truths that lead 
us astray because they sound so well ? Must we rush to action, 
Quixote-like, whenever we have an emotion ? What a tangled 
and disheartening place the world would soon come to be, 
especially to children, if they acted on this rule ! The truth 
seems rather to be, that although emotion habitually escaping 
in the sigh and tear alone results in such characters as that of 
the sentimental and inactive girl, yet our minds are capable of 
storing up emotions through which our characters become 
gradually changed. So at least some of our own poets have 
said, — poets who, like Wordsworth, had observed and medi- 
tated deeply upon the human heart. Moreover, morality is as 
much a matter of inhibition as of action. The one whose 
mind is softened by pity and guided by reason is likely to be 
considerate of others, i. e., moral. 



1 James, Talks to Teachers^ Chapter XVI., New York, 1899. 



1 64 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

The study of literature in the elementary schools is to be 
conducted, then, with reference to these foregoing aims : 
Wider knowledge of life, mental training, aesthetic pleasure, and 
the cultivation of the moral sense. 

We now proceed to a consideration of the problems involved 

in the teaching of literature. We are met at the outset by a 

very interesting question : Can literature be 

Literature taught? Some ingenious arguments have been 
be Taught? 6 & to 

offered to show that it cannot. Literature, we 

are told, is a thing of the spirit, of the emotions, intangible, 
elusive, evanescent under the light of analysis like the dew- 
drop under the sun. Examples of ludicrous failures to im- 
part the spirit of literature could be gathered in every school. 
But these would, we believe, only prove that literature had 
not been well taught in those instances. 

One element in literature is the intellectual. It includes 
the meaning of the words, the meaning of the sentences, the 
relation of parts to each other and to the whole 
piece, and the general thought involved in the 
whole. These are matters indisputably within the scope of 
ordinary teaching. The pupil may be told these, or led to dis- 
cover them ; he may, moreover, be examined upon them, so 
that the most exacting standard can be satisfied. 

The other element in literature is concerned with the 
vaguer province of taste and feeling. These are often subtle, 
Taste and intangible, elusive. An intellectual grasp of the 
Feeling. ideas does not insure the resultant complex of 

emotions that go with full appreciation. The book may be 
understood, and yet seem dull. To secure results in this field 
is at once difficult and essential to true success in teaching 
literature. But we must believe that it can be done because 
it often is done. To help the pupil get both the thought and 
the feeling, to supply him with the necessary associations or 



1 See J. Churton Collins on The Study of Literature ; London, 1891, a 
discussion on the question, Can Literature be Tatight? by Andrew Lang, 
in The Illustrated London News, and a reply by Professor Brander 
Matthews in The Educational Review, April, 1892. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 165 

the materials out of which to make them for himself, to show 
him the beauty of form, the fitness of phrase and the music of 
language, — in other words, to help him not merely to under- 
stand but to appreciate, — is part of the teacher's work in 
teaching literature. We have said that taste and emotion are 
subtle things ; and their subtlety appears not less in their origin 
and growth than in their essence. The atmosphere of the 
school, its standards and ideals ; the personality of the teacher, 
his attitude towards things beautiful and good ; all these enter 
into the sum of impressions that go to form the child's tastes 
and emotions ; and in no part of the school work do they 
count for so much as in the hours devoted to literature. To 
be strong without being crude, to be gentle without being 
weak, to be sensitive to beauty without being sentimental, and, 
above all, to be able tactfully to show these characteristics in 
the most human of the school- room subjects, the lesson in 
literature, is to have the first and best means of success. Taste 
and feeling are associative, contagious. What the strong 
teacher has to give, most of his pupils will get ; what he sees 
and feels they may be led in part to see and feel. But they 
will see and feel in varying degrees ; some of them much, some 
little or none. The aesthetic faculties are in general sooner 
reached by literature than by other forms of art, — pictures 
possibly excepted. But not every pupil will enjoy the same 
literature, or be helped to enjoy it by the same teacher. If the 
sum of failures be small, the work will have been well done. 

When the teacher confronts the class with a poem or story 
to be taught, the question he must answer is, What shall I do 
with it? The question must concern not only the given piece 
of literature, but the given class ; it may therefore be restated, 
How shall I bring this class to understand and appreciate this 
piece of literature ? The answer is many-sided. 

1 . Literature is a thing for the ear as well as for the eye ; 
indeed, it was originally a thing only for the ear. This fact 
leads to several conclusions. (1) Much can and 0ra j 
should be read aloud to the children which they LiteratDre: 
cannot yet read for themselves. A class of ten-year-olds can 



1 66 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

follow Tennyson's Idylls of the King, Scott's novels, Macaulay's 
ballads, and many other things whose difficulties of thought 
Easy to an d- diction are overcome and whose substance is 

understand, rendered real and lifelike by the teacher's oral 
renderings. 

(2) The pleasures of literature are enhanced by the culti- 
vation of the ear. The rhythms of verse and prose, the fitness 
Trains the between the sound and the idea, often escape the 
Ear * child unless he hears them. He has not learned 
to read literature until he has come to hear the sound while he 
reads silently. And the necessary equipment for this feat is a 
full memory of the sounds of literary pieces. Naturally the 
more resonant types of literature are the best for the early 
years. The rhythms of the nursery rhymes, and of heroic 
poems like Burns's Bannockburn, Campbell's Ye Mariners 
of England, Browning's How they Brought the Good News 
from Ghent to Aix, and Tennyson's The Charge of the Light 
Brigade are a better introduction to rhythmic writing than 
are the subtler forms of Shelley and Milton. 

(3) The oral reading, either by the teacher or by the 

pupils, is a good means of passing in review the whole poem, 

. and seizing it as a single unity, after it has been 

Grasping the studied in detail. It is also of frequent value in 
Whole. H 

arousing interest before the closer study begins. 

Many people owe their first real appreciation of literature to 

some good reader. 

2. The mere presentation of an object is not the whole of 

teaching. A class in biology might find the sight of a crayfish 

Literature a ver ^ interesting, but could hardly be said to have 

st li dfd 0be studied the crayfish until it had learned something 

of its anatomy, its habits, and its general biological 

relationships. Neither is a piece of literature known until the 

relation of its parts is comprehended, and the general ideas or 

feelings it is meant to convey appreciated. In a given piece 

of literature there are words to be learned, pictures to be 

formed in the imagination, structure to be Considered, allusions 

to be understood and appreciated, figures of speech to be felt 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 1 67 

and comprehended, a fundamental notion to be grasped, com- 
parisons with other mental possessions to be made, and, in 
growing degree as we pass from the lower to the higher grades, 
taste and critical judgment to be cultivated. 

(1) Reading must begin with an understanding of the 
meaning of the words. If the words that are new or that sug- 
gest strange or incomprehensible ideas are so many 

as to bring discouragement, something simpler must Meanings 
° ° f ° r of Words, 

be chosen. The meanings of the words are often 

given before the piece is read. This is well, if there are not 

many new words to be given. On the other hand, anything new 

is better remembered if learned just at the point where it is 

needed ; and the habit of looking for the meanings of words — 

partly by conjecture from the context, partly by reference to 

the dictionary — should be begun early. The insidious habit 

of guessing at a word and " letting it go at that " is a vice of 

thousands of otherwise thoughtful readers. When new words 

are met, they are to be learned in their sound, in-their written 

form, and in their application ; in the later grades it is often 

useful and interesting to learn their origin. 

(2) Most of our literature is more or less allusive. The 

point of many a good thing is lost to us if we do not get the 

allusion involved. Sometimes it is enough to know 

The 
the origin and significance of an allusion ; as, for Treatment 

1 •'■ u • urj u * of Allusions, 

example, in such sayings as " He has an axe to 

grind," or " He has paid too dear for his whistle." In such 
cases a simple explanation of the meaning is sufficient. But 
there are other allusions, common in our best literature, which 
are not so easily dealt with ; allusions which are memories 
either of scenes from literature or history, or of the ideas and 
phrases of the great masters of English literature. Echoes of 
history, of classic and Norse mythology, of folk-tale and fable, 
of romantic story, of the Bible and Shakspere and Milton and 
all our other great literary storehouses, meet us everywhere. 
To understand the passages in which they occur it is generally 
necessary to know the allusion. But to appreciate the pas- 
sages, that is, to get the feeling that they should arouse, to en- 



1 68 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

joy them as a blending of old and new, with a background of 
memory and emotion, one should have known the allusion 
before, and, if possible, in its original place. For example, the 
reader has his pleasure doubled if he reads such lines as 

" In teacup times of hood and hoop. 
Or when the patch was worn/' 1 

with full memories of the manners of the eighteenth century ; 
or Milton's invocation at the beginning of Paradise Lost, 
with full memories of the English Bible. Such reading at its 
best is the result of ripe culture ; but the beginnings may be 
made in the elementary school. It is well to make references 
to what the children already know ; to associate the new thing 
they read with the same idea or the same feeling met elsewhere ; 
to get the pupils, in short, to read in this associative frame of 
mind. 

The peculiar difficulty of the task of cultivating such ap- 
preciation is apparent from the nature of the case. Our 
pleasure in these allusions comes, as we have already said, in 
associating the old with the new. Now, to the child, it is 
almost all new ; his stock of memories is small. And he, no 
more than we, takes pleasure in the allusion just learned. He 
learns it as a fact, briefly given, without power to arouse his 
imagination or his feelings : the allusion is explained, and he 
comprehends but does not enjoy. But the teacher is building 
for the future : when the same allusion again occurs, it comes 
as a memory, bringing the pleasure both of recognition and of 
former associations. Those allusions, however, which are 
learned not as allusions, but which have first been known in 
their original place in history or literature, are the best appre- 
ciated. The boy who has read the stories of the Round Table 
or the ballads of Macaulay will better appreciate a reference 
to Launcelot or Horatius than he who has only looked up the 
names in a book of reference. In this as in so many educa- 
tional problems, we must remember that we are working 



1 From Tennyson's The Talking Oak. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 1 69 

towards a remote end, through many imperfect results, and 
that we cannot make a " clean sweep " of the ground as we go. 

(3) Children are serious and literal. The jesting of adults 
often seems foolish to them ; it is not their kind of play. 
Figures of speech often seem absurd and useless Fig ureS of 
contradictions. But the ability to comprehend s P eecn « 
figurative language must be part of their intellectual training. 
Analysis, classification and naming of figures of speech, even 
in the upper grades, seem useless if not hopeless. What is 
needed is the ability to grasp the significance of the figure. 
To this end the teacher will sometimes interpret the figure, 
sometimes have the children interpret it, point out the respect 
in which* the comparison holds, and state the idea in literal 
language. Further than this it seems undesirable to go in the 
elementary schools. 

(4) Galton pointed out 1 a number of years ago that the 
untrained mind thinks largely in terms of pictures. The 
greatest pleasure, if not the greatest profit, that T]ie 
children have in reading is in the mental pictures Imagination, 
of scenes and action. For this reason, such books as The 
Arabian Nights and Robinso7i Crusoe remain perennially fresh 
and new. Nor does this power of picturing what one reads 
ever lose its value for the adult. The material of the imagina- 
tion is the stock in trade of the artist, the writer, the scientist, 
and the man of affairs. The trained mind may come to think 
less in pictures and more in general terms ; but it will still owe 
much of its pleasure and of its effectiveness in creative work 
to the imagination. From yet another point of view than that 
of aesthetic pleasure or creative efficiency, the vividness of the 
image is of the highest importance, (a) The imagination is 
the readiest means of reaching the emotions. Therefore the 
pictures that are left in the imagination by good literature are 
a better stimulus to right action, a more potent cause of good 
taste than are the abstract and reasoned formulae of instruction. 
(b) That which definitely impresses the memory as a picture 



Inquiries into Human Faculty, New York, 1883. 



170 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

is better remembered than are the analytical and critical judg- 
ments deduced from the study of literature, (c) In growing 
minds the memories already stored up come to have new 
applications and new significance. If the story is remembered 
merely as an ethical teaching of a certain sort, it is not likely 
ever to take on new meaning ; but if it is remembered as a 
story, that is, as a representation of some fragment of the 
drama of human life, it remains there to produce new emotions 
and to stimulate new inferences as the mind becomes enlarged 
by new experience. For example, the memory of Robinson 
Crusoe's single-handed fight with nature means something to 
the boy, but much more to the man who has had a decade of 
the struggle for a foothold in the world. 

The formation of the picture is, therefore, one of the first 
things to be looked to in teaching literature. Sometimes the 
Filling out pupils' efforts need to be supplemented by a sug- 
a Scene. gestion from the teacher, by some artist's repre- 

sentation of the scene, or by some other means which may 
help the class to see more vividly. Suppose they are reading 
the tournament scene from Ivanhoe. It will seldom be enough 
merely to have the scene read. The arrangement of the lists, 
the positions of the combatants and the spectators, the armour 
and the gay costumes glittering in the sunlight, the successive 
steps of the action, and all the details in that rich and pic- 
turesque scene should be inquired about by the teacher and 
talked of freely by the class. An outline sketch drawn on 
the blackboard will give a basis for the topography of the 
picture. In general, such detailed discussion is not only 
useful in helping the pupils to get the scene fully, but is an 
exercise which will give the keenest pleasure and stimulate 
the liveliest intellectual activity. 

In this connection it is necessary to discuss the place of 
illustrative material. If, as has been asserted, the power to 
illustrative form the picture is the condition of enjoyment of 
Material. fa e scenej we m ust take account of the stock 
of memories which the pupils have and out of which they are 
to make the new picture. Obviously there are wide differ- 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 1 71 

ences in their mental outfits. The observant country boy 
would need no help to see Whittier's Barefoot Boy or Bryant's 
Waterfowl except the stimulating questions of the teacher. 
But the ocean to an untravelled inland boy, or the scenes 
of Snow Bound to a Southern boy, would be very vague. 
So the wild mountain scenery of Scott, or the masterpieces 
of art, or the scenes of conflict involving long-past customs 
and accoutrements, may lose much of their vividness for 
lack of a background of appropriate memories. It is here 
that the importance of illustrative material appears. The use 
of good and cheap pictures in the school-room has steadily 
grown, and they may now be procured with little cost and 
trouble. Pictures will not take the place of first-hand knowl- 
edge ; but they will do much to help the pupil to a fair appre- 
ciation of a scene made of such elements as they represent. 
There is, however, another side to this question which must 
not be overlooked. Literature is a thing not only of the eye, 
but of the spirit. Its vital interests are, after all, not in the 
visible scene, not in the landscape, not in the visual reproduc- 
tion of the physical counterparts of vanished heroes, — but in 
deeds, in feeling, in character. " The world of literature is 
the world of the imagination ; and its ideals, its activities, its 
types of character find their best reflection in the mirror of the 
mind. It may help to give a sense of reality to the scenes of 
The Lady of the Lake to see a photograph of Scotch moun- 
tains ; but the best evidence of the greatness of the poem is 
that its stirring actions and emotions may appeal to a boy who 
has never seen any landscape but New Jersey sand-flats or 
stretches of level prairie. The heroism portrayed in one of 
Macaulay's Lays of Ancient Rome may thrill a boy whose 
limited historical knowledge would lead him to think of Caesar 
and Pericles as contemporaries, dressed in modern regimentals. 
This is not to deny the gain in understanding and appreciation 
from having a background of geographical and historical con- 
ditions in the mind of the reader ; it is to assert, rather, that 
great literature is universal in its appeal, because its essential 
interest is concerned with the realm of the mind and feelings, 



172 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

and not primarily with the realm of historical and geograph- 
ical fact. Hence the illustrative material which is most 
helpful is that which presents, like the literature, the ideal 
elements." 1 

(5) A literary work has form and structure; like a painting, 
it has a definite arrangement of parts designed to present its 

The Study of *^ ea m t ^ ie most e ^ ect ^ ve manner. To appreciate 
structure. this structure is a part of right reading. Ob- 
viously the consideration of literary form has no place in the 
primary grades. At that stage the child's whole mental energy 
is used in the effort to get the content. He has no energy left 
to give to thoughts of structure, no interest in such matters, 
and no adequate analytic power ; it is enough for him now 
only to get the picture clearly, to understand the idea, and to 
experience the appropriate emotions. Later in the course, in 
the second half of the elementary school, he can begin to 
consider how a literary work is constituted. He can see that 
a story has " a beginning, a middle, and an end " ; that an in- 
cident belongs here rather than there ; that there is a regular 
sequence of causes and effects ; that there are various ways of 
presenting character; that there is inherent fitness between 
scene and incident ; that, in short, the literary composition is 
not a chance collocation of ideas, but an organic structure. 
Minute and critical analysis is not meant, but only the percep- 
tion of the larger and more obvious elements in structure. 
Such a study could be made of the form of Longfellow's 
King Robert of Sicily. The story falls easily into the following 
divisions : — 

1. The opening scene, the church, the chant, and the 
haughty words of the King. 

2. The change : his appearance, his discovery of the Angel 
in his place, and his baffled rage. 

3. His humiliation in the various scenes that follow. 

4. His penitence, and his restoration to the throne. 



1 Teachers College Record, I. No. 3, May, 1900. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 1 73 

It would be noted that the setting and tone are ecclesiastical 
and religious ; that the splendour of the journey to Rome is in 
contrast with the condition of the deposed King; that his 
repentance comes appropriately at the solemn festival of 
Easter; and that, as in the opening he is presented giving 
defiance to the Church's teaching of humility, so in the end 
his courtiers find him kneeling by the throne in silent prayer. 
Other points in the structure and in the descriptive details 
would appear ; these are suggested as typical. 1 

Or, suppose the lesson be on some prose classic, like Irving's 
Rip Van Winkle,. As introduction there might be the gen- 
eral comment that this is Irving's treatment of a legend found 
among the old Dutch inhabitants, or that the story is one form 
of a common myth, that of the fabulously long sleep. After 
a first rapid reading of the piece, some of its simpler literary 
touches could be pointed out : the early intimation of coming 
improbabilities in the " faery mountains " and similar phrases ; 
the various points of view in which Rip's character is shown ; 
the relation between this and his presence in the mountains, 
and the effects upon him of what he sees upon his return to 
his native village. Throughout the story the well-chosen word 
and the felicitous phrase should be noted, that the pupils may 
come to enjoy the piece, not only as a good story, but also as a 
well-written story. Reference would of course be made to 
Jefferson's version of the tale and his inimitable treatment of 
the character. 

There are many good essays, like the best of Lamb's, with 
their quaint humour and genial tone, and some of Burroughs's, 
with their observant, half-scientific, half-literary attitude towards 
nature, which should find a place in the school-room. In 
reading the essay the main purpose will be to get and enjoy 
the author's ideas. Study of the form will be limited, perhaps, 
to noting the larger divisions of the thought, the attitude of 



1 For critical studies of this sort the teacher will find a valuable and 
interesting book in Winchester's Principles of Literary Criticism, New 
York, 1899. 



174 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

the author towards his subject, the things that are obviously 
well-said. In the treatment of all the types, indeed, it is to 
be borne steadily in mind that the grasp of the thought, the 
appreciation of the story, the experiencing of the emotion, — 
in general, the enrichment of the pupil's mind, — is the prime 
object of the work. 

It is not, however, to be assumed that every literary work is 
perfect in all its parts ; such uninformed criticism finds itself 
involved in strange difficulties through its attempt to justify 
every detail. 

It is sometimes objected that such work cannot be done in 
the elementary school, because pupils have neither the interest 

nor the ability for it. Such an objection, happily, 
An Objection. , , J . . A Jt .- 

need not be met on a priori grounds. It is an- 
swered by the fact that such work is now done in many 
schools, and apparently with as good results in interest and 
intelligence as any part of the school program. The essential 
conditions are a reasonably intelligent set of pupils, a commu- 
nity able and willing to buy books, a properly ordered course 
of study, and intelligent teachers. 

(6) From the analytical treatment of the literature, as de- 
scribed above, to the critical view of it, is but a step. And it 
c "tical ^ as seeme d to many teachers of sanguine tempera- 

Study, ment as if that step could easily be taken. In 

certain large city school systems, the writing of " book- 
reviews " or "criticisms" has become established as a regular 
school exercise in the seventh and eighth grades. The results 
are provocative of doubt. One can discern in these efforts 
something of the hollowness and insincerity associated with 
the school compositions of a generation ago. Borrowed 
phrases involving judgments beyond the reach of school chil- 
dren, and seen to be borrowed by the looseness of their ap- 
plication, are too frequent. Hasty generalizations, lack of 
perspective, misplaced enthusiasm, and all the vices of the 
" ill-fed criticism " of the contemporary periodical are here 
in miniature. Formal written criticism, judged by its results, 
seems to be a failure. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 175 

And yet we should all agree that we want to bring the pupils 

to a proper critical attitude, — proper, that is, to their age and 

development. As the elementary school ends the 

school life of so many pupils, their attitude towards Attitude 

, Desirable, 

literature becomes, in a democratic government, a 

thing of national importance ; for their attitude towards litera- 
ture is closely related to many of the qualities that make for or 
against good citizenship. 1 The problem is difficult. We can- 
not rest the case on authority, for " the authority of criticism " 
is an unstable thing. We cannot trust to independence of 
judgment, for the mass of pupils are barred by the lack of time 
and ability from acquiring the store of ideas and the power of 
discrimination necessary to right independent judgment. Out 
of the complexities of the situation seem to emerge certain 
principles that may be accepted and applied : (a) As the 
pupil's mind grows in wealth of ideas and in power of mak- 
ing judgments, it is desirable that he should turn over, ex- 
amine, and put into words his impressions from the literature 
he has read. This he does also with impressions from other 
sources. (£>) As his introspective life enlarges, he will natur- 
ally seek to find and express reasons for his approval or dis- 
approval of his literary experiences. This, too, he does with 
regard to other experiences, seeking to justify and explain them 
by reference to standards acquired in the world of thought, 
feeling, and taste. (c) It is desirable that certain standards 
of judgment be given him. These standards will not be 
aesthetic formulae, which he could neither understand nor apply, 
but memories vivid and complete of pieces of literature con- 
ceded by the lovers of good literature to be good. To these 
as standards in expression, in taste, and in judgment, he could 
unconsciously refer the new things that he reads. As the pupil 
whose home life supplies him with memories of refined and 
considerate behaviour has a basis for judging rudeness and self- 
ishness, so the pupil with a store of good literary memories 



1 See the discussion in President Hadley's Education of the American 
Citizen, New York, 1901. 



176 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

has a basis for judging the tawdry and shallow stuff that he 
meets in print. It must be admitted that he will often fail to 
make such reference ; that the memory of Gray's Elegy or 
Shakspere's Julius Ccesar will not always remain as a 
touchstone of sentiment or of character study ; that, indeed, 
even those whose appreciation of literature is best in the 
elementary school and whose love of good literature leads them 
to continue to read good books after their school days, will 
probably never know much good literature well or critically. 
But the inadequacy of the means to produce the highest result 
is no proof of their lack of value. The school must do the 
best it can with the means at command ; and it may well ex- 
pect in its teaching of literature to raise, though slightly, the 
general average of intelligence, feeling, and morality. And who 
dares deny the efficacy of church or school because it does not 
fully achieve its own ideals? 

(7) Another aim that the teaching of the literature must 

include is an appreciation of the spirit and significance of the 

piece of literature as a whole. Failure in such ap- 
Studyofthe v . . .,,.-, 

Fundamental preciation, not uncommon even in adults, is due 

Id. 63. 

generally to the lack of the thoughtful attitude of 
mind. Many readers never ask themselves, Why did the author 
write this? What was his interest in this theme? How did he 
see it ? And yet these are interesting questions, capable often 
of a simple answer. Wordsworth's pleasure in the memory of 
the picture of the Daffodils or of the Solitary Reaper, Whittier's 
pleasure in the childhood memories of Snow Bound or The 
Barefoot Boy, Dickens's delight in caricature and the absurdities 
of Pickwick Papers, or in the portrayal of generous sentiment 
among the lowly, ought to be easily within the discernment of 
a child of twelve. We do not know a piece of literature until 
we know its fundamental idea, its spirit, its motive. 

(8) It has long been a practice to have children commit to 

memory bits of good literature. It is to be hoped that the 

practice will never die out. Provided the liter- 
Memorizing. . 

ature is well selected, — that is, good in itself 

and adapted to the pupils' development, — provided also that 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 1 77 

the exercise is not made hateful as task-work, the custom has 
certain obvious advantages : It enlarges and enriches the 
vocabulary ; it cultivates the sense of rhythm ; it supplies a 
storehouse of memories valuable for their beauty, their wisdom, 
and their ethics ; it makes surer the possession of a touchstone 
by which other literatures, and even life, may be judged ; and, 
finally, much that is thus learned in childhood, though only 
partially appreciated then, takes on new meaning and beauty 
in later life. 

(9) Recent educational activity has been much concerned 
with courses of study, and what is called " correlation " has 
provoked much printed matter. English, as the 
subject including the largest number of topics of 
human knowledge, has been regarded as the principal instru- 
ment of correlation. It has been attempted so to choose and 
dispose the literature in the elementary school course that noth- 
ing read shall be unrelated to some central subject or interest 
then before the school. Such a centre of interest might be the 
science, the history, the manual work, or even the season of the 
year. Thus there might be a butterfly month, or a Revolutionary 
month, or a basket month, or a snow month, in the year's pro- 
gram. It might impart a little welcome enlivenment to these 
pages to reprint some of the schemes that have been gravely 
offered. But the subject is really entitled to serious discussion. 

The following principles can, I think, be maintained : — 

(#) That correlation overdone deprives the school day of 
that variety of interest which is the need and the demand of 
normal childhood. 

(£) That forced and artificial correlation, which seizes upon 
accidental rather than essential relationships, helps to destroy 
rather than to cultivate good habits of thought. 

(r) That it is just as valuable an exercise to bring subjects 
that have been learned some time since to bear upon subjects 
now under discussion, as to range them side by side on the 
same day or in the same week. Indeed, the comparison is 
often the more effective when one of the ideas has become an 
old and thoroughly assimilated mental possession. 

12 



178 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

(d) That each of the school subjects is, or should be, of 
sufficient worth to be studied for itself, in its own spirit and 
method, rather than be made a mere handmaiden of other 
subjects. 

(<?) To teach the facts of history or science with the colour- 
ing of sentiment and imagination proper to the literary use of 
these facts, is to teach bad history or bad science ; and to make 
a lesson in history of Barbara Frietchie, a lesson in nature 
study of the myth of Arachne, or a lesson in geography of The 
Rime of the Ancient Mariner is to endanger a work of art 
without getting any adequate return in either history, nature 
study, or geography. Such a misuse of material merely argues 
ignorance and loose thinking. 

(/) There is a legitimate use of correlation in literature, 
which consists in bringing in, in right proportion, in the right 
spirit, and at the right time, facts and ideas borrowed from 
other provinces of human thought. To know the feeling of 
New England prior to the war will help to explain Whittier's 
anti-slavery poems ; to know something of icebergs and the 
Sargasso Sea will make more vivid certain passages in The 
Rime of the Ancient Mariner ; to know a spider and its web 
helps us to enjoy the myth of Arachne. But we must dis- 
criminate between what is principal and what is subordinate, 
between what is vital and what is accidental. Whittier's anti- 
slavery poems are an expression of emotion and belief that 
were personal, although shared by many of his contemporaries ; 
the story of the Ancient Mariner is a story of a spiritual ex- 
perience, set in a weird and picturesque region where the laws 
of geography have little place ; and the myth of Arachne is an 
imaginative attempt to account for a fact in nature by reference 
to certain well-known human traits. And the right use, in a 
literature lesson, of the ideas borrowed from history, from geog- 
raphy, and from nature study, is to employ them merely to 
interpret and make vivid the literature. 

(g) It seems in place to add as a final comment on this 
subject that correlation is only thinking. There is no thinking 
without bringing ideas together, and no educated person either 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION lj§ 

tries to think only in terms of one department of human 
knowledge, or confuses the appropriate relationships of the 
ideas he brings together. 

v (10) The study of literary biography remains to be con- 
sicrered. It is desirable that children know — largely for future 
use — the authors of what they read, and their L i terary 
time and place. It is also sometimes desirable Biographies, 
that they know something of these biographies, in so far as they 
are related to the work in a way that the children can under- 
stand. Certain limitations must, however, be pointed out. 

{a) The lives of literary men are usually uninteresting if 
not incomprehensible, to children. They better understand 
the actions and motives which lead to achievements of another 
sort : of warriors, rulers, inventors, discoverers. The subtle 
relations between the poet's experiences and his work are for 
older minds. 

(b) Mere personalia are not biography in any worthy sense 
of the term ; at best they are only gossip. 1 

(r) The study of the biography of an author is best taken 
up after the study of his work. There is until then no reason 
whatever why the child should care to hear anything about the 
man, 

(n) In considering a piece of literature, under such topics 

as the foregoing, the question of lesson plans and 

, & ? , , . . . Lesson Plans, 

the conduct of the lesson must receive special 

consideration. 

(a) What should a lesson plan include? Elaborate plans 
are usually a burden. No teacher can foresee just what direc- 
tion the treatment of a lesson will have to take. To adhere to 
the minutiae of a full and elaborate plan will be to disregard 
many of the most valuable opportunities arising from the 
spontaneous doubts, difficulties, and ideas of the class. The 
best points of a lesson are often those that spring up, as it 



1 See Lowell's sane and lively essay on " Chapman/' and Agnes Rep- 
plier's essay on " Biography" in Counsel on the Reading of Books, Boston, 
1901. 



180 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

were, by accident : they are often more vivid to the pupils, 
and more needed than anything that the teacher can fore- 
see. Elaborate plans should be made during a teacher's 
period of training or in the beginning of his career. But the 
sooner he can discard them, the better will be his teaching. 
The full plan is of value principally in the teacher's own 
preparation. 

(<£) Some plan, however, the teacher must have : a few 
large points, carefully thought out and associated firmly in his 
Working mind with a considerable number of details. To 
Outlines. fc ls j ar g e outline he must adhere if he wishes the 

lesson to have unity, — that is, to leave in the minds of the 
class a unified impression of the literature as a whole, and of 
the beauty, interest, and significance of its parts. 

(e) In preparing such a plan there are certain things to be 
considered : the appropriate form of introduction ; the meaning 
and spirit of the piece as a whole, — that is, the author's feeling, 
meaning, or point of view ; the story or thought itself, in whole 
and in details ; the relation of its parts ; the type of literary 
form to which it belongs ; the meanings of words and allusions ; 
the literary beauties of form and picture ; the presentation of 
the work as a whole. 1 A plan of the sort here meant is 
illustrated in the following treatment, for the sixth grade, of 
Browning's How They Brought the Good News from Ghent to 
Aix : — 

i. An introduction, giving Browning's account of how he 
came to write the poem. 

2. A brief comparison of it in theme and spirit 
to some of the ballads and other poems of action 
which the children have read. 

3. Call attention to the scene at starting. 

4. Note the galloping movement of the verse, and its fitness 
to the theme. 



1 This is manifestly impossible in a long classic, extending through a 
number of lessons. In such cases the constant reference to preceding 
portions of a work will enable the pupil to grasp it as a whole. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 1 8 1 

5. Note the hurry of the action. 

6. By what means is the horse Roland shown to be the hero 
of the poem? 

7. How are the flight of time and the distance travelled 
given ? 

8. Pick out (a) the vivid and effective scenes, (b) the lines 
whose sound is pleasing. 

9. What now appears to have been the author's own interest 
in the story ; that is, his motive in writing it ? 

10. Have the poem read by good readers in the class. 

As the poem has " no historical basis whatever," its place in 
time need not trouble us. As to its geography, the location of 
Ghent and Aix may be briefly mentioned. What the poem 
should leave uppermost in the minds of the pupils is the 
spirited language and action, the succession of vivid scenes 
that pass through the mind of the poet, and the sympathetic 
portrayal of the horse as the hero of the story. 

It is evident that some pieces of literature will need fuller 
analysis, others less. Sometimes the best results are reached 
by the mere reading of the selection by the class or the teacher. 
No general rule can be laid down, except that already given, 
that the literature is to be so treated as to secure the fullest 
appreciation of which the class is capable. Analysis is valuable 
in proportion as it reveals new ideas within the interest and 
comprehension of the class, and is a true interpretation of the 
literature ; and a plan is valuable mainly according to the 
selection of the topics to be presented. 

The starting-point in learning any new thing is past expe- 
riences : things are known when they become related to things 

already known. Hence arises the custom of begin- 

Introductions, 
nmg a new subject with an introduction designed 

to link the new with the old. It is possible to make such an 

introduction either serviceable or useless. An introduction is 

useless if it relates the literature to ideas with which the 

literature has nothing in common ; worse than useless, if it 

starts associations out of harmony with the spirit and tone 



1 82 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

of the literature. An introduction is serviceable when it arouses 
interest in the coming subject, furnishes information neces- 
sary for comprehending the subject, or puts the pupils into 
the appropriate attitude of mind and feeling. Sometimes the 
teacher may begin with no introduction, knowing the neces- 
sary "apperceptive mass" to be already there; sometimes the 
general nature of the story may be touched upon, as, " This is 
a story of how a mistreated animal secured justice for himself " ; 1 
sometimes the literature will be referred to some experience 
the children have had, or to some other literature which it 
resembles or from which it differs. It has been said already 
that one test of the successful teaching of a piece of literature 
is the leaving the student with a true impression of its spirit 
and general purport. It is to this aim that the introduction 
also should address itself. 

The present writer believes that literature is a subject for 
study ; that to assume that intellectual effort brought to bear on 
Outside a subject makes it distasteful is to hold a brief for 

Study. f^g s tupid and the lazy ; that while it is true that some 

literature needs no study to understand its message, the most 
of the literature read in the schools needs an active and an open 
mind. That he apply himself to a subject and master it so far 
as he can is a just demand to make of the pupil in the elementary 
school. To do this he should have more time than the class- 
room treatment of the subject allows. " Home study," so 
called, should include the literature as well as the other subjects. 
Such study, if left unguided, is not likely to have definite re- 
sults. After the stage at which the mere learning to read is 
the main object, it is well to give the pupil certain topics to 
consider, certain questions to answer, upon the literature he is 
asked to study. These topics would naturally be from the 
teacher's plan for presenting the work. It is equally a mistake 
here, however, to adhere to this method until it becomes a stiff 
and mechanical thing. The value of spontaneous activity must 
not be forgotten. 



1 Longfellow's The Bell of Atri. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 183 

(12) Amid the bewildering multiplicity of printed things 

the inexpert are lost. The art of using books and papers well 

and economically must be learned as a means to _, 

J Slow and 

an intellectual life. Even the man who does little Rapid 

Reading, 
reading needs to learn not only how to pick and 

choose, but how to read rapidly or slowly. 1 So inherent in our 

civilization are the conditions that call for these different 

powers, that they should be cultivated in the elementary 

school ; it should be one of the specific objects of the work in 

literature to train not only in the close and careful reading 

which the literary classic and the text-book require, but also 

in the rapid and cursory reading which is enough for the 

lighter and simpler stuff. In work of the latter kind, however, 

the teacher needs to be on guard against the formation of 

slip-shod habits. 

3. In the foregoing pages it has been argued that literature 

has a place on the tongue and in the ear, and that it is a thing 

to be taught and studied. It now remains to con- . 

. . . , _,, . . c Literature 

sider it as a thing to be enioyed. This point of as a Source 
. , , , , • , ,. of Pleasure. 

view has, indeed, been assumed in the preceding 

discussion ; but it is bound up with other considerations that 

are here to be presented. 

(1) The choice of literature for the schools must always 
take account of childish interests and childish powers. To 
attempt to force the interest too far is not only to choose what 
invite failure, but to cultivate an unfortunate tedium is En i°y aWe * 
and dislike for good literature. Pupils must be led on by 
gentle steps from the easy to the more difficult, and from the 
cheap to the precious. The boy whose palate is depraved to 
the "penny dreadful" will find Wordsworth stupid; but he 
may find Cooper and Stevenson a good transition to Scott 
and Homer, and thence to literature more subjective and 
contemplative. 

(2) The study and the teaching must have pleasure as well 



1 See an article on " The Pace in Reading," Atlantic Monthly, 
June, 1902. 



1 84 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

as profit in view : pleasure of the intellect and pleasure of the 
emotions. Good teaching of literature will increase week 
by week the child's storehouse of agreeable 
Literature memories ; will give him a private theatre where- 
SoiS?of en in are enacted stirring scenes, where sweet and 
Pleasure. w - ge vo j ces are heard, and where he can feel that 

he is living a fuller and finer life. 

(3) The school reading should be only an introduction to 
the world of books. Encourage home reading ; find time to 

have the children talk of what they have read ; 
Collateral , . * . ' 

Reading ; Use suggest new poems and new stories m connection 
of Libraries. . , , , . . , . . , , 

with what has already been read in school or out ; 

have books about the school-room to tempt them to read, and 
strengthen the temptation by reading choice bits to them ; 
strike an alliance with the public libraries : the custodians of 
the library are, in general, more than willing to oblige the 
teachers and the children. Where public libraries do not 
exist, a school library may be gradually formed at small cost : 
one excellent plan is to begin with " grade libraries," each 
grade of the school gradually building up by voluntary con- 
tributions a library for itself, leaving it for the next group 
of children, and, in turn, passing into its inheritance from 
the grade above. From such a series of nuclei, growing 
by the stimulus of immediate interest and possession, might 
be formed, in a few years and at little cost, a good school 
library. 

In the discussion of the problems arising in the teaching 
of literature, it remains to consider the form and extent of 
Complete tne units to be presented. We have seen the 
vsfscnooi passing of the supremacy of the school reader and 
Readers. ^\q introduction of the classics into the school. 

The views of the late Mr. Scudder express the spirit of this 
important movement : 1 — 



1 Literature in the Schools, by H. E. Scudder, Boston, 1888. See also 
Superintendent Maxwell in The New York Teachers' Monograph, 
New York, November, 1898. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 1 85 

" The real point of practical reform, however, is not in the 
preference of American authors to English, but in the careful 
concentration of the minds of boys and girls upon standard 
American literature, in opposition to a dissipation over a desul- 
tory and mechanical acquaintance with scraps from a variety 
of sources, good, bad, and indifferent. In my paper on Nur- 
sery Classics in School, I argued that there is a true economy 
in substituting the great books of that portion of the world's lit- 
erature which represents the childhood of the world's mind for 
the thin, quickly forgotten, feeble imaginations of insignificant 
bookmakers. There is an equally noble economy in engaging 
the child's mind, when it is passing out of an immature state 
into one of rational, intelligent appropriation of literature, upon 
such carefully chosen classic work as shall invigorate and 
deepen it. There is plenty of vagrancy in reading ; the public 
libraries and cheap papers are abundantly able to satisfy the 
truant; but it ought to be recognized once for all that the 
schools are to train the mind into appreciation of literature, 
not to amuse it with idle diversion ; to this end, the simplest 
and most direct method is to place before boys and girls for 
their regular task in reading, not scraps from this and that 
author, duly paragraphed and numbered, but a wisely selected 
series of works by men whom their country honours, and who 
have made their country worth living in. 

"The continuous reading of a classic is in itself a liberal 
education ; the fragmentary reading of commonplace lessons 
in minor morals, such as make up much of our reading-books, 
is a pitiful waste of growing mental powers. Even were our 
reading-books composed of choice selections from the highest 
literature, they would still miss the very great advantage which 
follows upon the steady growth of acquaintance with a sustained 
piece of literary art. I do not insist, of course, that Evangeline 
should be read at one session of the school, though it would be 
exceedingly helpful in training the powers of the mind if, after 
this poem had been read day by day for a few weeks, it were 
to be taken up first in its separate thirds, and then in an entire 
reading. What I claim is that the boy or girl who has read 
Evangeline through steadily has acquired a certain power in 
appropriating literature which is not to be had by reading a 
collection of minor poems, — the power of long-sustained 
attention and interest. 

" If we could substitute a full course of reading from the great 



1 86 ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

American authors for a course in any existing graded series of 
readers, we should gain a further advantage in teaching children 
literature without frightening them with the vast spectre of 
literature. Moliere's doctor 1 spoke prose all his life without 
discovering it, and children taught to read literature may 
escape the haunting sense that there is a serious, vague study 
known as literature, which has hand-books and manuals, and 
vast dictionaries, and cyclopaedias, and Heaven knows what 
mountains shutting it out from the view of ordinary mortals. 
There is a deal of mischief in teaching young people about 
literature and perhaps giving them occasional specimens, 
but all the while keeping them at a distance from the real 
thing." 

With Mr. Scudder's views as to the value of the complete 
classic over the unrelated fragment skilful teachers have no 
difference. The previous discussions of the treatment of the 
literature as an organic unity are based upon the assumption 
that entire compositions are read. It still remains, however, 
to be pointed out : — ■ 

(i) That there are many authors whose good things are so 
small and so few that they cannot well be supplied apart from 
the school reader ; 2 

(2) That many of the good things here meant are a part of 
the common property of even the imperfectly educated, and 
that to omit them is to cut the child off from a part of the 
common literary heritage ; 

(3) That many authors whose work in general is of high 
value have written but little that is suitable for the lower 
grades ; 

(4) That there are selections from longer works, scenes from 
Scott, Dickens, Shakspere ; lyrics from Shelley, Browning, 
and the dramatists : selections, indeed, from many of the 
larger works which the children can appreciate long before 
they can read the whole composition ; 



1 The reader will note the error in the allusion. 

2 It may be added that many good things may be culled from works 
which can never be rated as classics good enough to read entire. 



ENGLISH IN ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 187 

(5) That often the best introduction to a classic is some 
well-chosen selection ; and 

(6) That many fragments from the greater works, while 
they may lose something by absence from their setting, yet, 
like the songs from Pippa Passes and The Princess have in 
themselves sufficient organic unity to be appreciated apart 
from their context. 

In sum, the argument seems to lead to the conclusion that 
there is a place in the school for both the classic and the 
school reader. 



CHAPTER III 

ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

Part I. — Language 

GENERAL BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Report of the Committee of Ten on Secondary School Studies, with the 
Report of the Conferences Arranged by the Committee. American 
Book Co. 1894. 

Samuel Thurber. (1) The Three Parts of English Study: their Corre- 
lation in Secondary Teaching. American Institute of Instruc- 
tion, 1892, 132. (2) An Address to Teachers of English. Education, 
XVIII. 515. (3) English Work in the Secondary Schools. School 
Review, I. 638. (4) English in Secondary Schools ; Some Consider- 
ations as to its Aims and its Needs. School Review, II. 468, 540. 
(5) To what End do High Schools Teach English ? 

P. T. Baker. Course in English, Horace Mann School. In Teachers 
College Record, May, 1900, Vol. I. No. 3. 

A. S. Hill. English in Schools. In Our English. Harper. 1888. 

Percival Chubb. The Teaching of English. Macmillan. 1902. 

Nothing has so impeded the proper development of a 
thorough secondary course in English as the traditional 
English a system of breaking up the subject into a consid- 

Singie Subject. eraD ] e number of smaller divisions, the mutual 
relation of which is far from obvious. The old secondary 
curriculum included elocution, oratory, grammar, composition, 
rhetoric, the study of certain works of literature, the history 
of English literature, versification, — not to mention "word 
study," " bad English," and perhaps other matters. Indeed, 
the fact that there is one broad field, one single subject, 
English, which can be treated in the high school in a consecu- 
tive and systematic way, was long unknown, and is even now 
not often understood or appreciated. Nor, when this essential 
premise is accepted, is it easy to agree on the relation of part 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 189 

to part in the whole process of training which we include 
under the general term. It is, however, growing yearly more 
clear that no one kind of instruction in English can be effec- 
tive that is not planned with an understanding of the aim of 
all instruction in English. 

Secondary instruction in English has been dominated, 
during the nineteenth century, by three successive ideals, each 
of which has thrown stress on a special . and Three Points 
separate part of the whole subject. The first of View. 
ideal, grammatical correctness, was that of Lindley Murray, 
Noah Webster, and their contemporaries, whose one aim was 
that the pupil should understand the syntactical laws of the 
language and should have skill in the logical analysis of 
sentences and phrases. Half a century or more of teaching in 
which the emphasis was laid on these topics alone led to a 
sharp reaction of feeling, which tended to underestimate the 
benefits derived from the proper study of English grammar. 
The second i deal w as rhetorical correctness, and the period 
in which it was dominant may be roughly reckoned as begin- 
ning with the Harvard entrance requirements in English in 
1874. For nearly twenty years thereafter, the stress in 
secondary instruction was largely thrown on clearness and 
accuracy of written expression, to which the knowledge of 
English grammar was regarded as wholly subordinate. The 
third ideal, that now rapidly coming into prominence, is that 
of familiarity with and appreciation of English literature. It 
was first evident in high school instruction between 1885 and 
1890, in the form of a growing feeling that more attention 
should be devoted to English literature, without undue 
neglect of either grammar or rhetoric, and was first recognized 
by the colleges in the Yale entrance requirements of 1894, and 
the uniform entrance requirements adopted in the same year. 

The rapidly widening outlook of teachers has led to the 
building up of an ideal more stable than any of those men- 
tioned, — the ideal of a well-balanced course of The Essential 
instruction in the language and literature of the Elements, 
mother-tongue. What the essentials of such a course are, we 



190 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

have already considered in the opening chapter. We agreed 
that the mastery of the mother-tongue involved three elements : 
(i) the ability of the individual to understand the thoughts 
of others, whether spoken or written; (2) his ability to 
express his own thoughts adequately through spoken or 
written words; and (3) his ability to gain pleasure and profit 
through his native literature. We also pointed out that in- 
struction in effective expression involved training in grammar 
and rhetoric, as well as practice in composition ; that instruc- 
tion in effective oral expression involved these also, and, in 
addition, elocution and practice in speaking ; and that the 
development of the power to appreciate literature involves, 
not only the reading of literature with that object in view, 
but some knowledge of the history of literature, a familiar 
acquaintance with a certain number of literary masterpieces of 
various epochs, and a realization of the characteristic traits of 
the race or the nation which are revealed in its literature. 

With these three essential elements or aims of instruction 
clearly in mind, we can now take up in detail such points 
regarding the matter or method of instruction as are most 
in need of discussion, under the general heads of language 
and literature. 

I. Language : Grammar 
BIBLIOGRAPHY * 

S, E. Lang. Modern Teaching of Grammar, Educational Review, 

XXI. 294. , 
F. A. Barbour, The Teaching of English Grammar. Ginn. 1901. 
E. C. Bowen. On Teaching by Means of Grammar. In Essays on a 

Liberal Education. Edited by F. W. Farrar. Macmillan. 1867. 
E. A. Abbott. On the Teaching of English Grammar. In P. A. 

Barnett's Teaching and Organization. Longmans. 1897. 
S. S. Laurie. Lectures on Language and Linguistic Method in the 

School. Chapter VII. 
E.A.Allen. English grammar Viewed from All Sides. Education, 

VII. 460. 
O. F. Emerson. The Teaching of English Grammar. School Review, 

V. 129, : 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 191 

W. D. Whitney. Essentials of English Grammar. Ginn. 1877. 

Preface. 
ft. G. White. Words and their Uses. Houghton, Mifflin & Co. 1870. 

Chapters IX. and X. 

The old theory was that grammar inculcated correctness 

by teaching the laws that rule language. Such a doctrine was 

the natural outcome of the study of the classical 

1 1 • 1 j 1 1 What is the 

languages, in which concord plays so large a part Aim of 

in syntactical relations : to be ignorant of the real 
basis of agreement was, in Latin and Greek, to be ignorant 
of the real basis of the literary language. Two other circum- 
stances united to aid the association of grammar with correct- 
ness. First, the prevailing attitude toward language in France 
and England, during the eighteenth century and during the 
early part of the nineteenth century, was highly rational and 
philosophic, not to say metaphysical. Language was supposed 
(erroneously, of course) to follow the laws of logic and reason. 1 
Second, the difference between the forms of language spoken 
by people in Various parts of the same country was at that 
time even greater than it is now. In France, Germany, Italy, 
Spain, and even in England, the spoken language of great 
masses of people differed radically in many points of inflection 
and syntax from that spoken by other large groups of people, 
and all differed in many important particulars from the written, 
literary, or " standard " language. Only those who knew the 
inflectional and syntactical laws sanctioned by grammar, which 
was based on the literary language, could speak or write 
" correctly." 

As time went on, however, marked changes appeared in the 
attitude taken toward grammar both by investigators and by 
teachers. First, it became clear that the teaching The M 0dern 
of the rules of grammar, particularly in the mechan- Tlieor y' 
ical way then in vogue, scarcely produced the result desired. 



1 The movement began with the Port-Royal Grammaire generate et 
raisonnee (1660), and is very fully and interestingly described in Petit de 
Julleville, Histoire de la Langue et Litterature franqaise, V. 723 ff. and 
VI. 821 ff. 



192 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

Children learned the rules, recited them glibly, but did not 
thus acquire the habit of employing the usages sanctioned by 
the literary language. 1 It was plain rule-grammar did not 
suffice to produce correctness in speech, any more than rule- 
arithmetic produced real skill in calculating. One might speak 
correctly without a knowledge of the rules ; even with the 
knowledge of the rules one might speak incorrectly. Second, 
it has become evident that, of all the modern European lan- 
guages, English is the one to which the old laws of concord apply 
least, owing to the fact that we have so few inflections. 2 Third, 
with the development of modern philology, the attitude of 
investigators toward language has greatly changed. They no 
longer deem themselves arbiters of speech, but simply recorders 
of usage, humble searchers for the hidden laws that seem to 
guide language. They no longer despise dialects or deal ex- 
clusively .with the literary language. What their task is, and 
what, from the scientific point of view, grammar has become, 
is well stated by Professor Whitney, in the preface to his Es- 
sentials of English Grammar (1870) : — 

"That the leading object of the study of English grammar is 
to teach the correct use of English, is, in my view, an error, and 
one which is gradually becoming removed, giving way to the 
sounder opinion that grammar is a reflective study of language, 
for a variety of purposes, of which correctness is only one, and 
a secondary or subordinate one, — by no means unimportant, 



1 The correcting of " bad English " was long a part of the course in 
grammar. Driven thence; it took refuge under the wing of rhetoric. 
The main objection to the frequent use of this form of exercise is that it 
seems to throw the emphasis on incorrect expressions and to tend to 
make the pupil familiar with them rather than with the correct forms. 
To the use of the exercise from time to time there can be no real objec- 
tion, especially in the case of pupils who are already too familiar with 
the incorrect forms, provided that the specimens are really normal " bad 
English." 

2 See, for a popular statement of the facts, R. G. White's chapter on 
the "Grammarless Tongue" in Words and their Uses, and, for a more 
scientific statement, O. Jespersen, Progress in Language, with Special Ref- 
erence to English, Macmillan, 1894. 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 1 93 

but best attained indirectly. It should be a pervading element 
in the whole school and home training of the young, to make 
them use their own tongue with accuracy and force ; and, 
along with any special drilling directed to this end, some of 
the rudimentary distinctions and rules of grammar are con- 
veniently taught ; but that is not the study of grammar, and it 
will not bear the intrusion of much formal grammar without 
being spoiled for its own ends. It is constant use and prac- 
tice, under never-failing watch and correction, that makes good 
writers and speakers ; the appreciation of direct authority is 
the most efficient corrective. Grammar has its part to con- 
tribute, but rather in the higher than in the lower stages of the 
work. One must be a somewhat reflective user of language to 
amend even here and there a point by grammatical reasons ; 
and no one ever changed from a bad speaker to a good one 
by applying the rules of grammar to what he said. To teach 
English grammar to an English speaker is, as it seems to me, 
to take advantage of the fact that the pupil knows the facts of 
the language, in order to turn his attention to the underlying 
principles and relations, to the philosophy of language as illus- 
trated in his own use of it, in a more effective manner than is 
otherwise possible." 

In England, France, and Germany, where the schools must 
often struggle to give to pupils speaking a dialect a clear idea 
of the usages of the literary language, the chief The Present 
aim of grammar is still generally thought to be the status * 
inculcating of syntactical and inflectional " correctness." In 
parts of the United States where the foreign element is strong- 
est, the same may properly be the case. As a rule, however, 
we have come to depend, for the purpose of teaching " cor- 
rectness," largely on the now greatly increased instruction in 
composition and in literature, and to look upon grammar as 
a means both for giving the young some knowledge of the facts 
of language and for thus training them in the analysis and 
structure of sentences. 

The history of the teaching of grammar in Germany, France, 
England, and the United States seems in the main to have 
been the same. The grammarians who aimed at correctness 
by rule were in the ascendancy in the eighteenth century and 

13 



194 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

in the early part of the nineteenth. They were, as we have 
previously pointed out, the successors of the old grammarians 
of the Latin tongue, accustomed only to mechan- 
Grammar ical methods of dealing with the facts of a dead 
aug • language, known to them almost entirely in its 
somewhat artificial literary form. This school was represented 
in England and the United States by Lindley Murray. It was 
followed by what might be called the logical or metaphysical 
school/ typified by Becker in Germany, and by many minor 
grammarians in France, England, and the United States. 1 Con- 
ceiving of language as based on reason and as the logical com- 
bination of certain parts of speech, each of which represented a 
sort of abstract entity, these writers improved on their prede- 
cessors by offering systems which had at least the merit of being 
logical, but which laboured under the disadvantage both of being 
often unsound [and of being almost wholly beyond the actual 
comprehension of the young and immature. 2 The reaction, 
beginning in Germany with such scholars as Grimm, finally 
triumphed, and resulted for a while in a general prejudice 
against the older schools, in a widespread suspicion of the 
possibility of teaching grammar at all, — at least, of teaching 
anything but the bare and necessary facts of language. 8 



1 On the French movement, see I. Carre, " L'Enseignement de la 
Langue francaise," in Recneil des Monographies pedagogiques, 1889, IV. 

50-55- 

2 A good illustration is the old definition of the ''potential" mood as 
" that form of a verb which expresses the power, liberty, possibility, or 
necessity of being, action, or passion." 

3 " Two generations ago the watchwords of the parties into which the 
educational world was divided were 'Grammar thorough and systematic ' 
and 'No teaching of grammar in the schools.' On the one side were 
ranged men like Becker and Wurst, who declared, in Becker's words, 
that ' since the instruction in language is in its own nature theoretical, 
grammar, especially the grammar of the mother-tongue, should be the 
proper gymnastic school, in which the intellectual powers may be practised 
and developed.' Against them stood the famous philologist, Jacob Grimm, 
who urged that the natural unconscious growth of speech should not 
be stunted by ' the misconceived and misshapen rules of the pedant,' 
and protested that the emphasis laid on grammar tended ' to draw the 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 195 

The reaction, however, was in its essence directed against 
the old system of teaching grammar, not against the teaching 
of grammar in itself, and systematic instruction in the inflections, 
syntax, and word-order of the native language is now generally 
accepted as a part of higher elementary or secondary education 
in all civilized countries. 

The main objections urged against the study of The Main 
grammar are as follows : — S^study of 

(1) The learning of a multitude of rules does Grajfimar « 
not help the pupil to speak and write correctly. 

(2) The philosophic distinctions of formal grammar are 
meaningless except to the advanced student. 

(3) Exercises in the parsing and analysis of literature tend 
to give one a distaste both for literature and for grammar. 

(4) The mental discipline supposed to be secured through 
the study of grammar may also be secured in other ways, as is 
shown by many scientific or business men, who, though with- 
out linguistic training, have been taught by observation and 
experience to think clearly and accurately. 

(5) Whatever facts about the language are necessary for a 
broad education may be readily acquired through familiarity 
with good literature. 

(6) Whatever knowledge of syntactical laws is necessary 
for information, for mental discipline, or linguistic training, 
can be more readily attained through the study of Latin. 1 

(7) English is a grammarless tongue. 



immature mind of the child to unfruitful abstractions and dry reflections.' 
His protest, though seconded by men of such influence as Wackernagel 
and Von Raumer, had little effect for twenty years. Then came the re- 
action in his favour and grammar has been deposed from the throne it 
once occupied." F. H. Dale, " The Teaching of the Mother Tongue." 

1 " And, finally, to the demand why, if boys must study language as a 
means of education, can they not study French and German, — the an- 
swer is, that the value of the classical tongues as means of education is 
in the very fact that they are dead, and that their structure is so remote 
from that of ours that to dismember their sentences and reconstruct 
them according to our own fashion of speaking is such an exercise of 



196 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

" Government, and agreement, and apposition, and gender, 
have no place in the construction of the English sentence ; 
tense is confined to the necessary distinction between what is 
passing, or may pass, and what has passed, and case, to the 
simple expression of possession. This being the condition of 
the English language, grammar, in the usual sense of the word, 
— 1. <?., syntax according to etymology [better, on the basis of 
inflection], — is impossible, for inflected forms and the conse- 
quent relations of words are the conditions, sine qua non, of 
grammar. In speaking or writing English, we have only to 
choose the right words and put them into the right places, re- 
specting no laws but those of reason, conforming to no order 
but that which we call ' logical.' " 1 

Objections In ie P ] Y> {t ma Y be ur S ed : — 
Answered. ^ That we no longer attempt to teach correct- 
ness of expression by means of grammar. 

(2) That only the simplest logical distinctions are at- 
tempted in the best modern teaching of grammar. The old 
" metaphysical " school is rapidly passing away, and there is 
little or nothing in recent good text-books that cannot be 
readily understood by a pupil of fifteen or sixteen. 

(3) That the old system of multitudinous exercises in 
parsing and analysis is now discarded, or retained only in a 
sufficient degree to make sure that the pupil is capable of 
understanding the structure of the English sentence. 

(4) That no one would deny that mental discipline can be 
secured in many ways, or that men learn to think accurately 
and hence to express themselves accurately and logically, 



perception, judgment, and memory, such a training in thought and in the 
use of language, as can be found in no other study or intellectual exer- 
tion of which immature and untrained persons of ordinary power are com- 
petent. To us of English race and speech this discipline is more severe, 
and therefore more valuable, than to any people of the [European] Con- 
tinent, because of the greater distance, in this respect, between our 
own language than between any one of theirs and the Greek and Latin." 
R. G. White, Words and their Uses, Chapter IX., " Grammar, English, 
and Latin." See also H. Corson, Claims of Literary Culture, 1875. 
1 R. G. White, Words and their Uses, 324. 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 1 97 

through the experiences of life. Grammar merely aids this 
process. 

(5) That, although experience has shown that "correct- 
ness " is best attained, as a rule, through familiarity with the 
use of the " standard " language in conversation and in litera- 
ture, experience also goes directly counter to the assumption 
that an adequate knowledge of the laws and principles of the 
language can be thus commonly acquired, without the help of 
formal or systematic grammar. 

(6) That, although students may gain a knowledge' of the 
syntactical laws of our language through the study of Latin, 
(a) not all pupils have the opportunity of studying Latin; 
(<£) such a knowledge of English syntax is an almost indis- 
pensable preliminary to the study of Latin, as the complaints 
of experienced Latin teachers show ; and (c) the whole sys- 
tem of Latin grammar is, in many respects, so different from 
that of English grammar that it seems absurd to learn by 
partial inference what might more easily be taught directly. 

(7) That the well-known facts brought out by R. G. White 
and others do not show that English is a grammarless tongue, 
but only, so to speak, a concordless tongue. The objection 
holds good against the old conception of grammar, but has no 
weight against the modern conception of grammar. 

It seems clear, then, on the whole, that the main objections 

to the study of grammar apply to it as taught by antiquated 

methods, or rather to antiquated conceptions of 

. Summary. 

grammar. The general conclusion seems to be, 

on the part of the most thoughtful teachers, that high school 

pupils need, in some way or other, to be trained systematically 

in a knowledge of the important facts relating to inflection, 

syntax, sentence- structure, word-order, and word-composition, 

in their native language. This point of view, the resultant of 

several oscillating changes during the nineteenth century, is 

well expressed by Dr. Samuel Thurber : — 

" A certain amount of formal grammar, on the other hand, 
I consider extremely important. The distinction of subject 



19^ ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

and predicate, which is fundamental to thought and speech, is 
comprehensible even to children younger than high school 
youth. The names themselves, like many other grammatical 
terms, are not merely technical, but belong to the vocabulary 
of educated persons. Intelligible and interesting to youth are 
the distinction of subject and object, the distinction of princi- 
pal and subordinate elements, the meaning of noun, verb, and 
the parts of speech generally ; of preposition, number, gen- 
der, and finally of case, tense, mode, relation, and govern- 
ment. . . . Tracing grammatical relations is a most excellent 
discipline, and the knowledge in which it issues is a most use- 
ful knowledge. Through parsing and analysis we gain facility 
in following the language, sometimes difficult and involved, of 
writers like Milton. No one can go far in Shakspere with- 
out noting the peculiarities of his grammar. And you cannot 
conceive a beginning of a study of a foreign language without 
perpetual consideration of grammatical topics. Therefore I 
recommend parsing and analysis, to occupy a certain quantu- 
lum of our precious English time. It will not hurt a pupil's 
appreciation to parse a little of Paradise Lost. The opinion 
we often hear expressed that to parse beautiful prose or verse 
blunts the aesthetic enjoyment of it as literature, I simply 
laugh at. The onslaught on grammar which culminated some 
years ago was a senseless panic. Of late I believe the educa- 
tional world is recovering its wits." 1 

The question now arises, How shall this information be pre- 
sented to the pupil, how shall grammar be taught? In dis- 
cussing this question it is fair to admit at once that 
How shall , ., . , . , ., . . , r „ . , 

Grammar the pupil cannot be left wholly to himself to " pick 

up" the separate facts referred to and to gener- 
alize regarding them. Under such circumstances, experience 
shows that he would only rarely acquire the necessary infor- 
mation. Nor, as we have seen, can we depend exclusively on 
the teacher of Latin or of some modern foreign language to 
present certain facts or laws connected with the foreign lan- 
guage, which the pupil can by inference apply to his own lan- 



1 "English in Secondary Schools: Some Consideration as to its 
Aims and Needs," in School Review, II. 468, 540. 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 1 99 

guage, for it is just this preliminary information as to his own 
language which he needs to use in acquiring a systematic 
knowledge of the foreign language, It may also be regarded 
as generally admitted that the pupil shall have learned pro- 
gressively, from the fourth grade of the elementary school 
up, many of the chief facts relating to the inflection and 
syntax of English. It is clear, then, that the information we 
have described is already partly given him, in the main, by 
the teacher of English, and that it must now be given him 
systematically. The question under discussion, therefore, is, 
Shall grammar be taught in the high school deductively, 
as it is usually taught in the United States and England ; 
inductively, as is the custom in Germany; or by both 
methods ? 

The time-honoured deductive method of teaching grammar 
in the United States and England is well illustrated by the 
text-books of Mason, widely used in England, and xheDeduc- 
of Whitney, widely used in the United States, tive Method. 
The order of procedure in each is definition, example, appli- 
cation. The pupil first learns "the definition, for example, of 
a noun; then notices examples of nouns; then applies his 
knowledge to exercises in picking out nouns from among 
other words. 1 

In Germany, where text-books in grammar are little used, 
the method is almost invariably inductive. In Prussia the law 
is that " grammatical instruction must be limited <ji, e j,,^^ 
to what is strictly necessary, and must always rest tive Method, 
on definite examples. German grammar must no longer 
be treated in the same way as the grammar of foreign 
languages." 2 The method is thus further explained by Mr. 
Dale : — 



1 Both books stand for the method most in use during the last quarter 
of the nineteenth century. Other books differ from this point of view 
only in giving less emphasis to application, and more to definition and 
example, 

2 " Curricula and Programmes of Work for Higher Schools in 
Prussia." 



200 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

" An instance of construction is found in some piece that 
the class is learning ; the sentence is written on the black- 
board, and the boys look for more examples of the same kind. 
Under the questioning of the teacher, and by comparison of 
the instances, they gradually elicit the rule, which, after being 
repeated, is written down in a note-book with a model sen- 
tence. Their next piece of composition is then so planned as 
to involve the use of the construction already learned. Thus 
the two steps on which emphasis are laid are: (i) that the 
instance selected should always be one appealing to the chil- 
dren by its content; and (2) that the rule should never be 
given but always found, and when found, embodied in a con- 
crete sentence again. Abstract and universal statements are, 
as far as possible, kept in the background." l 

Either extreme seems equally absurd. To teach grammar 
by a set of generalizations destroys, to a considerable de- 
gree, the value of the training, though no more 
Objections & ' &> & 

to either than would the same method when employed in 

any other subject. The pupil tends to learn by 
rote, to see only what he is told to see ; he does not gain 
the power of observing and generalizing for himself on lin- 
guistic matters ; he conceives of grammar as a more or less 
formal philosophy which has little or nothing to do with the 
actual processes of language as they reveal themselves in 
conversation, in composition, or in literature. On the other 
hand, the German method is wasteful- of time and effort. 
Why devote hour after hour to the discovery by induction of 
laws that can be easily stated, explained, and remembered, 
and to the laborious writing out in exercise-books of gen- ■ 
eralizations which can be found recorded in any elementary 
text-book ? 2 



1 F. H. Dale, "The Teaching of the Mother Tongue in Germany.*' 

2 The wastefulness of the method in this respect reminds one of the 
solemn farce of the late Professor Zupitza's lectures on the elements of 
Anglo-Saxon. One of the great scholars of his time, he deliberately 
chose to spend weeks in dictating to a large class of apparently earnest 
students facts that any sensible person could find in a good text-book 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 201 

The special advantage of the German system is that it 
allows the continual exercise of the student on grammatical 
principles throughout the whole course. Grammar xne just 
is thus not the task of a single term or a single Mean - 
year, but of many years. It is kept steadily in mind during 
the pupil's entire secondary training, and, though rarely or 
never appearing alone as a separate subject, it is a constant 
factor in the work in composition and in literature. The dis- 
advantage of the system lies wholly in its cumbrousness. 
It seems plain, therefore, that American teachers, dealing with 
a language which is fortunately far less complicated in its 
grammar than German, will find it wise to retain their custom 
of making grammar, for a year or a part of a year, a separate 
subject of systematic study, and to adopt the German custom 
of connecting the incidental study of grammar with all com- 
position and literature throughout the course. 

In schools where, owing to local causes of one sort or 

another, a large proportion of the pupils are children of 

foreign immigrants or come from families of the 

Essential 
unintelligent class, it may often be necessary, in Parts of 

. . , Grammar. 

teaching grammar, to return to primitive methods, 

and to regard the study as a special instrument for securing 

syntactical correctness. In such cases emphasis will be thrown 

on the accurate knowledge of the inflectional system and the 

few laws of concord, and abundant exercises are desirable. 

Where, however, as will normally be the case throughout the 

United States, pupils are fairly well accustomed to the use of 

good English in point of syntax and inflection, the emphasis 

of the course should be laid on the analysis and structure of 

the sentence. The facts of inflection and syntax can be 

quickly learned. The essential thing is that the pupil shall 

be able to separate any ordinary English sentence into its 



and commit to memory at his convenience. What we craved, in such 
university lectures, was the comments and explanations of a great 
scholar; what we received was largely a mass of comparatively trivial 
facts, easily obtainable elsewhere, but none the less written down with 
trustful solemnity by the spectacled band of novices. 



202 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

component parts and to state the relation of each to the 
others. The boy who once learns this simple process can 
never forget it, for it becomes immediately the first guiding 
principle in the understanding of all that he reads and in the 
composition of all that he says or writes. 

The older method was to begin the study of systematic 
grammar with the classification of words. Each part of 
Plan of speech was then taken up separately, its inflections 

instruction. ^}f anv ) described, the sub-classifications indicated, 
and a method given for parsing each type of word. Having 
thus mastered the preliminary data, the pupil was taught how 
words could be combined into phrases and clauses, and how, 
either separately or in these group -forms, he could build up 
sentences of various degrees of complexity. He was thus 
prepared for the analysis of sentences. Nowadays the pupil 
usually has learned, in the various stages of elementary in- 
struction, to distinguish several of the parts of speech and to 
recognize the subject and the predicate in easy sentences. 
The method of systematic instruction may, under such circum- 
stances, be somewhat modified. It is possible, after a brief 
survey of the parts of speech, to begin immediately the work 
on analysis, returning later to the more careful consideration 
of the parts of speech. 

The point at issue, whether any considerable treatment of 
the larger unit (the sentence) is of advantage until the pupil 
has mastered the details relating to the smaller unit (the word), 
is precisely analogous to the similar point often raised in 
connection with the teaching of systematic rhetoric, whether 
it is advantageous to take up the paragraph before studying 
the structure of the sentence. In the case of grammar, it is 
clear that the interest of the student will be stimulated, and 
his appreciation of the real purpose of his work heightened, 
by some work on the sentence as early as possible in the 
course, although we think it wiser to postpone the thorough 
consideration of the sentence until the pupil is familiar with 
the details of classification, inflection, syntax, and the analysis 
of phrases. 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 203 

Many just objections have been brought against the old 
system of parsing : — 

(1) Parsing was carried to such an extreme, especially in 
connection with certain classics, that it killed all 
appreciation of them as literature. 

(2) Too much stress was laid on concord. English ad- 
jectives were said to agree with their nouns, for instance, after 
the fashion of the Latin grammarians. 1 

(3) Parsing fostered the un-English idea that each word 
was somehow created as one or another part of speech, instead 
of being, as is often the case, a symbol sometimes capable of 
several uses under several sets of circumstances. 

The modern ideas about parsing, on the other hand, are : — 

(1) That the exercise should be used only as a drill pre- 
liminary to analysis. The pupil needs to be trained in the 
statement of the relations of single words to each other until 
he is sufficiently familiar with these relations to recognize them 
instinctively. He is then ready to go on with the more com- 
plex task of separating sentences into their component phrases 
and clauses. Into this work parsing need not enter to any 
considerable extent. 

(2) That parsing should be made as simple as possible. 
The pupil should not be asked to indicate agreement when 
agreement does not actually exist, and, after he has once 
learned to recognize the case, number, voice, mood, or tense 
of words, it is scarcely necessary for him to continue indicating 
them in parsing, unless occasionally for purposes of review. 
Parsing thus reduces itself to {a) a statement of the class of 
words to which the word in question belongs, and {b) a state- 
ment of its function in the sentence. 

(3) That parsing should be made as little as possible of 
a mechanical exercise. There is danger that pupils may catch, 
so to speak, the knack of parsing, following some routine 



1 The best statement of the absurdities of " agreement " is that before 
referred to, the chapter "A Grammarless Tongue," in R. G. White's 
Words and their Uses. 



204 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

method, and developing a strange faculty for stating, after 
this fashion, linguistic relations which they do not really 
recognize. 

If parsing be thus shorn of its useless attachments of 
"agreement" and other non-existent relations, it practically 
Parsing and reduces itself to analysis on a smaller scale. We 
Analysis. parse when we show by the form or position of a 
word that it bears a certain relation to other words. Parsing 
we usually apply to separate words, and we associate with it 
the attempt to indicate minute details of sentence structure, 
though of course the parsing of a noun or a verb may at any 
time lead us to the fundamental analysis of a sentence. 
Best employed as a preliminary exercise, it assists the pupil 
in developing the power to recognize at once the relation 
of one word to another in any group of words which he can 
without difficulty hold in his mind as a unit. Analysis we 
usually associate with the dissection of long or intricate sen- 
tences into their component parts, feeling that when this 
larger analysis is accomplished we shall have little difficulty 
in applying the smaller process of analysis which we call 
parsing. 

With regard to analysis teachers are generally agreed : — 

(i) That the process should be made as simple as possible. 

(2) That it should, so far as possible, be done without the 
help of diagrams. The aim of the exercise is that the pupil 
Analysis and snou ld gain the power, possessed by all educated 
the Diagram. p eo ple, of recognizing, as he reads, the relation 
that the parts of a sentence bear to each other. The use 
of the diagram is not an end in itself, but merely a possible 
stage in the process. The intelligent pupil may not need 
it at all, and, if a class can be trained in analysis with- 
out requiring the diagram for purposes of understanding, 
it seems wrong to force upon it the use of the diagram 
simply for the convenience of the teacher. It would appear 
wise, then, {a) not to use diagrams unless necessary; and 
(£) if they are necessary, to discard them as soon as pos- 
sible after they have served their purpose, substituting the 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 205 

oral or written statement of the pupil as to the main facts of 
structure. 1 

(3) That, if a system of diagrams be used, it should be a 
very simple one. 

(4) That pains should be taken that the pupil does not 
acquire facility in making diagrams as a mechanical process 
without actually acquiring the power of intelligent analysis. 
This result may often be best attained by having the pupil use 
several systems of diagrams, inventing or adapting them as 
graphical methods of expressing grammatical relations. 

On no point does the teacher of English grammar need 
more to stand on his guard than in the matter of looking at 
English sentences with Latin eyes. For centuries Latin-English 
the makers of text-books of English grammar have Grammar - 
been men trained in highly inflected classical languages, wholly 
different from English in form, method, and spirit. The 
consequence has been that until very recent years we have 
been treating English as if it were Latin or Greek. Even 
now many teachers do not realize, so great is the hold of 
tradition, that English nouns rarely have gender and can 
scarcely be said to have more than two cases, that pure 
adjectives never " agree " with their substantives, and that 
verbs rarely " agree " with their subjects. It seems wise to 
do away, so far as possible, with all distinctions that apply to 
other languages but not to ours, and resolutely to set ourselves 
to look at our own language in the light of fact. 2 

One of the most striking achievements of the nineteenth 
century has been the conquest by scholars of the data relating 
to the development of the modern languages, — 
a conquest scientific in method, but romantic in Taught 
the passionate devotion shown by generations of s onca y * 
tireless investigators. It is now possible for the trained mind 



1 After all, the best clue as to whether a pupil can analyze a sentence is 
often whether he can read it aloud intelligently and with proper emphasis. 

2 Perhaps the greatest aid that can be secured from treatises in this 
process will be obtained from H. Sweet's A New English Grammar, 
Oxford, Clarendon Press, 2 vols., 1892 and 1898. 



206 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

to grasp the whole sequence of changes through which 
English words have passed before reaching their present 
forms and relations, just as it is possible for the well-trained 
mind to grasp the changes of form and structure by which the 
horse, the magnificent animal of to-day, has been developed 
from the odd little five-toed beast of the Eocene era. Fresh 
from such linguistic researches, it is only natural that ardent 
philologists have been eager to teach the grammar of Modern 
English by showing the evolution of the modern tongue through 
Early English and Middle English. The best plea for this 
method is that made by Prof. Mark Liddell, who says : — 

" We have in English historical grammar a subject that is 
scientific, practical, and of great educational value, and, more- 
over, a subject which can be taught in an elementary way to 
young students, and can at the same time furnish a field for 
original scientific work in university teaching. Why should it 
not be easily possible to put it in the place that dogmatic 
grammar used to occupy? Why is it necessary to wait until 
a student is nearly through with a university course to give 
him a scientific view of the machinery he thinks with? It 
would not be difficult to teach anybody to read Old English 
at the time when he begins to read Latin, to continue the 
work by teaching him to read Middle English, and then to 
put upon this elementary work, which need only be such as 
will give him the power roughly to read his own language in 
any period in its history, a more or less thorough training in 
English historical grammar. It is not necessary to make him 
speak Old English or Middle English, or even to seek native 
idioms in his own use of language. But surely a student with 
an accurate and correct knowledge of what his language is will 
be able to use it with more ease and power than one without 
such knowledge." x 

Strong as this plea is, there are two even stronger objections 
to be urged against it. First, the plan is not well adapted to 
secondary education. To study the modern lan- 
guage through its earlier forms would involve the 
work of several years. Not one high school student in ten, 



1 " English liistorical Grammar," Atlantic Monthly, July, 1898. 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 207 

perhaps not one in a hundred, would be justified in the ex- 
penditure of time and effort required. The method is, at 
best, adapted only to college instruction. Second, even if 
the system could be adopted in high schools, it is doubtful 
whether it would be advisable on the basis of sane educational 
theory and practice. The palaeontologist, and perhaps the 
expert veterinary surgeon, should perhaps know the evolution 
of the horse, but the actual user of the horse, the driver, has 
no need of such knowledge. His training must come through 
the practical handling of the present-day animal under diverse 
circumstances, and from such an understanding of his main 
characteristics and capabilities as shall spring from simple 
theory and wide experience. English grammar, the group of 
facts and principles that has to do with our handling of the 
present language, is self-explanatory, self-determining, regu- 
lated by the feelings, associations, and practices of to-day, 
without regard to its ancestry. To follow its evolution is 
highly interesting to the professed student of language, but 
not of great importance to the people at large. 1 

As has been pointed out, the modern grammarian feels that 
he has little to do, under ordinary circumstances, with "cor- 
rectness," or with the reasonableness or logic of Divided Usage 
given expressions. We no longer consider it our ** Grammar. 
duty to condemn " had rather " because it cannot be parsed 
under such and such rules, and to set up " would rather " as a 
more logical phrase. On the contrary, we treat " had rather " 
as an existing fact, — a fact to be explained or classified, if 
necessary, but not to be changed. The first and greatest prin- 
ciple of modern grammar is that the standard of our language 
is the usage of intelligent and educated English-speaking 
people, and that the business of modern grammar is to record 



1 This paragraph is to be understood as applying only to the historical 
method of teaching modern English grammar, and not to the incidental 
use of appropriate historical information in the course of instruction in 
systematic modern grammar, nor as applying to the possible study of 
historical English grammar, or of Old or Middle English, during the last 
year of the high school. 



208 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

and classify that usage, so far as regards the inflectional forms 
of words and the relation that words bear to one another when 
used in sentences. It is the custom of intelligent and educated 
English-speaking people to say, " he struck me " and " /struck 
hi?n" and the laws of pronominal inflection are based on these 
typical facts. If, however, in some inconceivable fashion, the 
users of the language should come to drop all distinction be- 
tween /and ?ne and he and him, as they have dropped the old 
distinction between ye and you, and should say "him struck 
me" and" me struck him" then grammar would simply change 
its generalizations about pronominal inflection. " Reason," in 
the formal or logical sense, does not enter into the question at all. 
Now, there are a few grammatical points on which the practice 
of intelligent speakers and writers differ, as, for instance, the 
much discussed question of the split infinitive. At first the 
users of the new form were so few that the grammarians ignored 
them ; then, as their number grew, the scientific grammarians 
called attention to the apparent anomaly, usually expressing 
their regret at the turn affairs were taking ; finally, as the num- 
ber increased very considerably, the scientific grammarians felt 
bound to restate their previous deduction in such a way as to 
cover both forms of expression. These double forms of ex- 
pression — another good example of which is " all but I went " 
and " all but vie went" — are now generally known as in- 
stances of divided usage. 

With regard to the place to be given to the double forms of 
expression in the teaching of English grammar, there are three 
Its Place in opinions. One body of teachers, especially those 
instruction, giving to grammar a sort of " verbal inspiration," 
think that divided usage should be wholly excluded. One 
form must be right, they would say, and another wrong. A 
second class, more scientific in its attitude, would acknowledge 
the position held by divided use in an ideal statement of 
English grammar, but would prefer to ignore it as much as 
possible, lest pupils should be puzzled and confused. A third 
would be inclined to give cases of divided usage, under ordi- 
nary circumstances, a certain prominence, that pupils might 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 209 

get the greater insight into the nature of language and of lin- 
guistic laws. I am disposed to favor the opinion last men- 
tioned. It must be remarked, however, that — 

(1) This does not mean that the teacher should sanction 
what he conceives to be unwarrantable license in usage. After 
showing, for example, that there are two ways of placing the 
adverbial modifier of the infinitive, he may with perfect pro- 
priety explain why he regards one way as far less desirable than 
the other. 

(2) Nor does it mean that pupils should necessarily be 
allowed their choice in such cases, though I believe that would 
be the wiser plan. The instructor may announce, after an 
explanation of the facts, that, for purposes of uniformity, one 
of the two forms will be regarded as the standard form in that 
class, precisely as a principal may with propriety announce 
that, for the sake of uniformity, traveller, traveler, and similar 
words should in that school regularly be spelled in one way 
and not in the other. 

(3) On no point is personal feeling more likely to be aroused 
than on questions of divided usage, and on no point is discus- 
sion likely to be less satisfactory unless carried on in the most 
impersonal and scientific fashion. Whenever anybody seems 
inclined to lose his temper, the treatment of such matters had 
better be immediately postponed or dismissed once for all. 

So much for the basis, aim, and method of the instruction 

in formal grammar. But where shall the course be placed? 

Some favour the last years of the elementary school, 

. The Time 

with a review towards the end of the high school to Teach 

1 1 r r- , , • , 11 Grammar, 

course ; others, the first year of the high school. 

The solution seems to depend upon circumstances rather than 
upon theory. In favoured communities, where literary tra- 
ditions are strong, the gradual inductive study of grammar 
may properly be supplemented in the seventh or eighth 
grade by the systematic study, which need not be again 
taken up until late in the high school course, if at all. The 
supplementary study of grammar, of which we shall speak in 
the next paragraph, can be relied on to keep the principles of 



210 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

the subject fresh in the pupil's mind. On the other hand, ex- 
perience shows that, taking the country as a whole, not many 
children enter the high school with what may be called a suffi- 
cient working knowledge of systematic grammar, and it would 
seem clear that in most cases the time in the elementary schools 
could have been more wisely spent on literature and composi- 
tion and the inductive study of grammar in connection with 
them. Pupils entering the high school without a good working 
knowledge of English grammar should certainly be put at once 
to work on it, for it is the essential preliminary to all high school 
work in English as well as in other languages. Under favour- 
able circumstances, and with a skilled and judicious teacher, 
the course may be completed in half a year. Except in ex- 
traordinary cases it should be completed in a year. 

When the course of formal instruction in systematic grammar 
stops, it is a grave mistake, I believe, to allow the subject to 

drop entirely from the pupil's mind : first, because 
Supplemen. r J x L 

tary Work in he must keep fresh such knowledge as he has, and, 

second, because he has much more to learn. As a 

matter of fact, however, American practice is weak in this 

respect, encouraging the student, in effect, to discontinue his 

efforts just when his need of grammar is greatest and when its 

connection with his work in composition and literature is most 

evident and important. 

So far as rhetoric and composition are concerned, the points 
most to be kept in mind in this supplementary work seem to 
be as follows : — 

(i) All errors in grammar should be corrected at once and 
with emphasis. There are, indeed, few that a pupil could 
make, after the thorough preliminary training which the second 
high school year presupposes, unless he has been unfortunate 
in his home influences or has some other tongue than English 
as his native speech. Pupils who, at this stage in their edu- 
cation, seem to have anything like a habit of ungrammatical 
expression need further special training. 

(2) The ability to make a clear-cut, well-proportioned 
English sentence depends primarily upon the grammatical 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 211 

instinct, — upon a keen sense of the relations which words or 
groups of words bear to each other. The teacher, therefore, 
will often find that pupils whose sentences are ungainly and 
sprawling are in need of further drill in grammar, and can 
with profit be put to analyzing their own sentences and, under 
proper direction, to rearranging the various elements in them. 

With the study of literature, which should be pursued con- 
secutively throughout the high school course, this supplement- 
ary teaching of grammar has even closer connections : — 

(i) Whenever there seems to be the slightest doubt, espe- 
cially in the work of the first and second years, that the pupil 
does not understand the meaning of a sentence, the teacher's 
first duty — unless the failure to grasp the thought comes 
from ignorance of the meaning of the words — should be to 
make sure that the pupil can analyze the sentence, so as to 
recognize its essential elements and their grammatical relations. 
When this has been done, it will often be found that the 
pupil's difficulty has been solved. 

(2) During the literature work of the first and second years 
it is wise to require, during each recitation, the oral analysis of 
at least one sentence and the parsing of several words. In 
this respect the study of English literature should differ only in 
degree from the study of the Greek and Latin classics. In his 
reading of Homer and Virgil the pupil is constantly alive not 
only to the fact that his knowledge of grammar is helping him 
to understand what he reads, but to the much more impressive 
fact that his instructor is likely at any point to test his under- 
standing of the text by pertinent grammatical questions. It 
would be rash to carry this method too far in the study of 
English literature, lest, as is very often the sad case with 
Homer and Virgil, the content be neglected for the outward 
form ; but it is certainly wise not to allow the pupil to lose 
sight, in his study of English literature, of the grammatical 
construction until it has become second nature with him to 
recognize it as he reads. 

(3) So far the supplementary teaching of grammar has 
been used only for purposes of review. It can also be em- 



212 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

ployed to give the pupil fresh knowledge. He can learn 
through it — in connection with his reading and under the 
direction of his teacher — all the more minute details of sys- 
tematic grammar, with which it is useless to surcharge the 
memory during the course of formal instruction. Such, for 
example, are the various anomalies of plural- making and the 
few other oddities of the scant system of English inflection, the 
shades of meaning indicated by the subjunctive, and, above all 
else, the laws of shall and will as used in literary English. 
The intricate set of idioms just mentioned cannot easily be 
learned by rote. In his formal study of grammar and rhetoric 
the pupil may come to understand the principles involved, but 
unless he has been familiar from childhood with the distinctions 
he will not thus learn to apply them. His only chance, there- 
fore, of mastering this baffling shibboleth of English speech lies 
in his drill in composition and his work in literature. Through 
these, even if he does not learn invariably to distinguish in 
his own speech between shall and will, he can at least be pre- 
served from the shame of not being able to recognize the finer 
shades of meaning in his own language which these two words 
often indicate. 

Etymology or word-composition was once a conspicuous 
part of formal grammar, and hapless youths were forced to 

learn lists of meaningless prefixes and suffixes from 
Etymology, . 

the Latin, Greek, and Anglo-Saxon. But such 

days are past or are rapidly passing. We still recognize the 

desirability of giving the pupil information on these subjects, 

but we prefer to do it incidentally rather than systematically. 

It would, indeed, be possible, if all high school children should 

be obliged to study Latin, to base on the elements of that 

study a short systematic course on the Latin side of etymology. 

As it is, the case of a formal and elaborate course in etymology 

is hopeless, for, to understand what they were doing, pupils 

should have some knowledge of both Latin and Anglo-Saxon, 

whereas few are acquainted with the first and none with the 

second. Much, however, may be accomplished by a method 

which is by no means unsystematic, but can scarcely be called 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 213 

formal or deductive ; we refer to the same process of incidental 
or supplementary teaching which proves of so much value in 
connection with the study of systematic grammar. Early in the 
high school course the teacher should find occasion to point out 
such Latin prefixes as trans ox post, perhaps allowing the class 
to gain this meaning by induction from their use in English 
words ; other common prefixes or suffixes, whether of Latin, 
Greek, or Old English origin, should in successive days be 
taken up, until the class has, within the course of several 
weeks, thus learned all the common prefixes, and suffixes, of 
whatever origin. For the first year this work would prob- 
ably be sufficient, so far as etymology goes, though the in- 
structor should often call attention to the history of English 
words, as they occur in the study of various masterpieces, and 
to notable changes of meaning. In the second, third, and 
fourth years, when some of the pupils are studying Latin or 
Greek or both, and some French or German, the time is ripe 
for the incidental study of the Greek, Latin, French, and Old 
English elements in English words, for the tracing of the his- 
tory of queer words, or words that have had strange fortunes, 
and for interesting talks on the history of the language, its re- 
markable characteristics, and the nature and composition of 
its vocabulary. The whole forms one of the most stimulating 
and valuable sides of English instruction, but it is impossible 
to lay down rules or principles for the guidance of the novice. 
Nothing but real learning will enable the teacher to give his 
pupil sound facts ; nothing but real skill, born of practice and 
forethought, will enable him to present the facts at the time 
and in the way that will alone cause them to be appreciated 
and remembered. 1 



1 It is to be hoped that text-books will be prepared which shall place 
pertinent information of this sort at the disposition of the teacher who is 
untrained in philology. An excellent beginning is made in J. M. Ander- 
son's A Study of English Words, American Book Company, 1897, which 
will serve as a guide to the general character of the matter described 
above. Trench's English Past and Present and On the Study of Words 
long were of great value in this regard, and were the main source of cur- 



214 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

Prosody, or the theory of versification, was originally treated 
as a part of systematic grammar, though usually in a per- 
functory fashion and according to a false system. 
Prosody. . c . 

In more recent years it does not seem often to be 

treated at all, and the ignorance of the subject among young 
people is simply appalling. It is not ignorance of technical 
details, but ignorance of matters vital to any appreciation of 
verse. They do not know how to read it or how to feel it; 
they miss all the beauty that comes from the simplest knowl- 
edge of poetical forms. But this ignorance is easily done 
away with. A few lessons, a little simple explanation patiently 
repeated, and the idea is plain : they see how words may be 
grouped, according to their accents, into lines or verses, and 
these lines grouped, usually by rhyme, into stanzas. It is hard 
to decide at what times pupils may best be given this instruc- 
tion. Much of it should have been given incidentally, from 
the earliest grades of the elementary school up, in connection 
with each piece of verse that has been read. But at some 
one time or, indeed, at several times, in the high school, 
it is wise to bring together and supplement this rapidly 
accumulating stock of information, that the pupil may feel 
that he understands the system of English verse as a system. 1 
A convenient time for getting a first glimpse into the 
system of English versification occurs undoubtedly in con- 
nection with the course in formal grammar. After much 
supplementary and incidental instruction in connection with 
the work in English literature, the subject may again be 
taken up in connection with the more advanced work in 
rhetoric. 



rent information on such subjects, but the rapid progress of philological 
research has invalidated many of the observations and generalizations 
contained in them. A sound treatment of much the same topics will be 
found in the similar manual recently prepared by Professors Greenough 
and Kittredge, Words and their Ways in English Speech, Macmillan, 1901. 
Much use may also be made of the Oxford New English Dictionary. 

1 If he has studied Virgil, he is quite likely to have gained, by infer- 
ence, an almost completely false notion of English versification, which 
has little in common with the Latin system. 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 21$ 

II. Language : Old and Middle English 

It is frequently urged that some attention should be paid in 
our secondary schools, as is done in those of other countries, 
to the older forms of the native language and lit- 
erature. The following subjects are those most and Middle 
generally suggested for such study: — 

( i ) The history of the English language. The object would 
be to give the pupil some idea of the general relation to each 
other of the main branches of the Indo-Aryan stock and par- 
ticularly of the Germanic languages ; the difference between 
synthetic and analytic languages ; the chief characteristics of 
Old English ; the changes that, coming from within or acting 
from without, turned Old English into Middle English, and 
Middle English into New English ; and such information re- 
garding historical English, grammar, phonetics, etymology, 
and cognate matter as may be suited to his comprehension. 
Text-books dealing with the subject are likely to be either 
simple and unscientific, or scientific but not simple enough for 
the young student, and this fact, as well as the fact that such 
instruction can scarcely be given except by a teacher thoroughly 
trained in English philology, makes the subject one not likely 
to be taken up in most schools. It is, however, plain that 
under skilful direction the ground indicated could be covered 
in lectures and recitations during half of the last high school 
year. 

(2) Old English. It is likewise plain that, under similar 
conditions, fourth-year pupils could in half a year gain a fairly 
adequate reading knowledge of early Anglo-Saxon prose. 

(3) Middle English. An equal period would also be 
sufficient to introduce pupils to Chaucer and to give them the 
same degree of proficiency in reading. 

It would obviously be absurd to put such studies previous 
to the fourth year, and few or none would be willing even then 
to prescribe them for all students. For presenting j- ayoura ]}ie 
them as elective studies for the fourth year, par- Arguments, 
ticularly for well-advanced pupils who are not going to college, 



2l6 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

there are several manifest advantages. Pupils show consid- 
erable interest in all three subjects (especially in the third) ; 
all three afford excellent mental discipline, improve the 
student's power of expression, increase his knowledge of litera- 
ture, and indeed widen his whole mental horizon by bringing 
him into close relation, at first hand, with great monuments in 
the history of his race. 

On the other hand, it is urged that a little knowledge is 
worse than none, and that we have as yet not enough time in 

our schools for even the indispensable parts of 
Adverse Ar- . . . _ .. . _ , . , 

guments and instruction in English. Both of these counter- 
Summary- , , , i T . , 

arguments may be doubted. It is curious that 

experts of all kinds, in their hatred of charlatanry, are inclined 
to oppose the introduction into the high school curriculum of 
subjects which could be treated with better results later in the 
course of a life devoted to learning. But certainly all such 
subjects cannot be postponed because they could be taught 
later to greater advantage, for then there would be little left to 
teach ; and the many who do not continue their education 
beyond the high school have a moral right to whatever knowl- 
edge will be of most service to them. And under such 
circumstances as we have pointed out, a knowledge of the 
older forms of the language would be to a considerable number 
a delight and an inspiration. It is true that there are problems 
of historical syntax and phonology of which they would still 
be ignorant, but they could learn to read the Afiglo-Saxon 
Chronicle and the Knights Tale, and draw from each an 
added insight into the wealth of English literature and the 
power and grace of the English language. As to the second 
point, it may be remarked that the situation is much better 
than it seems ; the battle for sufficient time for English is 
really won ; or victory is at least in sight. Having attained 
an assignment to English of three periods a week, as a mini- 
mum, throughout the course, teachers must now make sure 
that the time granted is used to the best advantage. My im- 
pression is that as the preparation in the elementary school 
improves, as good methods of instruction are introduced, and 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 217 

skilled teachers of English alone allowed to give instruction, 
we shall find, within the next few years, that what we have 
been doing with difficulty in four years can be done easily in 
three. In some schools this is already the case, and in such 
schools I advise, for the reasons mentioned above, an elective 
course in Old English, covering half a year ; an elective course 
in Middle English, completing the year ; and, accompanying 
them both, a course of instruction on the history of the 
language. 

Whatever may be thought with regard to the suggestions 
just made as to the probable value of systematic courses in the 
history of the language and in its older literature, Historical 
there can be little or no doubt as to the utility as^Spkmeu- 
of historical grammar when pursued in a supple- ^^ study. 
mentary way, precisely analogous to that employed in the 
supplementary study of modern English grammar. This sup- 
plementary study of historical grammar may indeed be re- 
garded as beginning with that of systematic modern English 
grammar, for there the teacher will often pause in his task to 
make clear the new by means of the old, explaining, for 
instance, the odd apostrophe in the possessives of nouns by 
the old inflectional system. The supplementary study of his- 
torical grammar, however, will be in large measure connected 
only with the course in English literature, where will be found 
a wide and fertile field. As Mr. Rolfe remarked, " It would 
seem no more than reasonable that the only grammar the 
majority of people will ever study or refer to should cover the 
English of Shakspere, Milton, and King James's Bible," 
though I should prefer not to include these necessary matters 
in systematic grammar, but to connect them with the supple- 
mentary work of which we are now speaking. No high school 
course in English literature would be thought adequate in 
which Shakspere and Milton did not play a considerable 
part, and teachers are coming more and more to see that the 
work in Shakspere cannot be properly presented to pupils 
who have not, for a few days at least, studied systematically 
the differences between the language of Shakspere and the 



2 1 8 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY ED UCA TION 

vernacular of to-day. Later writers are less rich in this 
respect, but the poems of Scott and Coleridge contain many- 
antique forms, and even in the prose of Addison points will 
arise that deserve attention. 



III. Language : Rhetoric and Composition 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

S. Thurber. Elementary English Composition in High Schools. The 
[Syracuse] Academy, November, 1889; Composition Topics, ibid., 
October, December, 1890; The Correction of School Compositions, 
ibid., June, 1891 ; The Limitations of the Secondary Teaching of 
English Composition, Education, December, 1893; The Conditions 
Needed for the Successful Teaching of English Composition, School 
Review, January, 1894; Five Axioms of Composition Teaching, ibid., 
January, 1897. 

F. N. Scott. References on the Teaching of Rhetoric and Composition. 
Contributions to Rhetorical Theory, IV. Sheehan & Co., Ann Arbor. 

Twenty Years of School and College English. Harvard University. 
1896. 

G. Buck. Recent Tendencies in the Teaching of English Composition. 
Educational Review, November, 1901. 

It is easy to trace the history of this department of second- 
ary English instruction and to define its present status. Up 
Present to a ^out 1880 the work done in rhetoric had been 

Rhetoric and °^ tne most f° rma l an ^ artificial sort, and was not 
Composition, often accompanied by practical exercises or com- 
positions. In some schools essays were written at rare inter- 
vals, but they were simply corrected in points of spelling and 
punctuation, and the writers at best given only a few offhand 
hints about plainness and conciseness of style. Two move- 
ments, both taking their rise in about 1880, combined to 
stimulate high school work in rhetoric and composition : first, 
the schools began to awake to the fact that they were neglect- 
ing an important subject, and, second, the colleges began to 
exert great pressure upon secondary schools, through entrance 
examinations, in favour of the same subject. At the outset, 






ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 219 

the main aim of both parties seemed to be " correctness," the 
discarded ideal of grammar, which had now been passed on 
to a new phase of language-teaching, though the unenlightened 
schools conceived of it as rectitude in matters of spelling and 
punctuation, and the colleges as rectitude in the choice of 
words and framing of sentences. The schools soon caught 
the new idea of impeccable neatness of expression, and were 
devoting themselves ardently to it, when, in the early years of 
the new decade, two ideas of considerable power were brought 
to bear on secondary instruction in English through the influ- 
ence and writings of Prof. Barrett Wendell and Prof. F. N. 
Scott. Each worked independently of the other, but the 
systems advocated by both agreed in two essential particulars : 
(1) that practice in writing counted for much more than 
theory; and (2) that the kind of "correctness " that was of 
the highest importance concerned not the word or the phrase, 
but the sentence, the paragraph, and the larger whole, — that, 
in brief, structure of thought was the main object to be kept 
in mind. These ideas were assimilated, throughout the coun- 
try, with great rapidity, and resulted in changing to a marked 
degree the amount and character of high school work in 
English. The amount of writing was largely increased, the 
character of instruction became far less formal and was de- 
voted rather to structure than to correctness of detail, though 
the latter was by no means neglected. Within the last few 
years, however, the strong tendency to make high school 
pupils write daily compositions and other similar exercises in 
great abundance has been checked by the feeling that it is not 
wise thus to force the immature mind into a habit that may 
prove to be only a fatal facility, and by the growing conviction 
that composition has in many schools been allowed unduly to 
overshadow literature. We seem, therefore, to be at the be- 
ginning of a period in which composition work in the high 
schools will be carried on in a better balanced fashion without 
going to any of the older extremes. 

In the discussions that follow we use the term " rhetoric " 
with reference to formal or systematic instruction in the theory 



220 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

of expression, parallel to instruction in formal or systematic 
grammar, and the term " composition " with reference to in- 
Distinction struction and practice in the art of expression, i. e., 
Rhetoric and essay-writing and similar exercises. The old fashion 
Composition. was t0 teach rhetoric but not composition. Con- 
versely, there are now some who believe that composition can 
be best taught without rhetoric. 

I have before called attention to the fact, once often disre- 
garded but now becoming generally recognized, that the study 

of rhetoric presupposes a knowledge of grammar. 
Rhetoric TT , .* rr , . .... . & & . 

presupposes Unless pupils are able intelligently to analyze any 
Grammar. .. _, .. , , . 

ordinary English sentence and to appreciate the 

relation existing between its component parts, they should 

not be permitted to take up rhetoric, for the essence of the 

latter study is that it considers the combination of sentences 

into larger groups according to given principles ; and how 

can one learn to deal thus with the higher powers, so to speak, 

of a form with the elements of which he is not thoroughly 

acquainted ? 

In connection with our discussion of grammar we found 

that teachers were generally agreed that young people stand 

«. „ „ , in need of a considerable amount of information 
Shall Formal 

Rhetoric be as to the facts and laws of their native language, 

Taught? & & ' 

but sometimes failed to agree as to whether this 

information was to be given them formally or systemat- 
ically, as a theory, or incidentally, in connection with other 
branches of English study. The same difference of opinion 
exists with regard to the teaching of rhetoric. Almost all 
teachers agree that there are certain facts, laws, principles, 
— call the information what you will, — that should be com- 
municated to their pupils. The question is, as in the case 
of grammar, Shall this be done formally or incidentally? 
Here we find three typical opinions : first, that rhetoric can 
be taught alone, as an abstract theory, in the way that physics 
and chemistry used to be taught; second, that rhetoric, 
consisting of a modicum of theory, can be best taught when 
accompanied by a considerable amount of composition work, 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 221 

just as physics is now taught by allowing at least an equal 
amount of laboratory work to supplement the theoretical 
work ; third, that the pupil need make no formal study of the 
theory, inasmuch as he will master what is necessary through 
his composition writing. 

The first opinion has now been generally rejected and need 
not be discussed. The third is held by many teachers of 
skill and experience, especially by those who teach (w^j^ 
composition in close connection with literature. Discussed. 
It is best stated by Dr. Samuel Thurber, who declares that he 
" would abolish formal rhetoric entirely from the course ; or 
at most give it a lesson or two at the very end as a sort of 
resume of the foregoing discipline. Applied rhetoric, remem- 
ber, will have been pursued during all the learner's school 
years. What the secondary school wants is the effects of 
rhetoric, not the science of it." 1 

Such teachers as Dr. Thurber would, then, prefer to give 
considerable practice in simple essay writing, and to bring 
out incidentally, as it were, the few principles of The Airoarent 
good writing with which it is necessary for the Necessity 

student to be familiar, or to develop them indue- Systematic 

/ . . Rhetoric, 

tively from the English classics which are being 

read in the class in literature. 2 On the other hand, pupils of 

that age work more effectively with a text-book than without 

one, and it is wholly natural and proper that this should be 

the case. It seems, too, reasonable, that in this, as in other 

subjects, the principles laid down should be arranged and 

related to each other in an orderly and logical manner, so 

that the pupil's mind may be trained by comprehending the 

subject as a system rather than as a bundle of facts. Indeed, 

the danger of teaching rhetoric is merely that it be taught 

badly, that is, in too great detail ; but against this danger the 



1 "English in Secondary Schools," School Review, October, 1894. 

2 Part of this paragraph, and of several paragraphs later in the 
chapter, are taken, with the permission of the Macmillan Co., from the 
author's Notes for Teachers of English Composition (1901). 



222 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

well-educated and experienced teacher has long since learned 
to be on his guard. Though convinced of the futility of the 
old system of studying rhetoric, by which the pupil learned by 
heart a vast number of rules and principles that scarcely 
stood the test of practice or investigation in later life, he will 
also, probably, be convinced of the possibility, as well as the 
practical utility, of putting before pupils at this stage of their 
progress a simple exposition of the elementary principles of 
the art of expression, provided that it is accompanied, in 
accordance with modern methods, by a thoroughly good set 
of graded exercises, so that the pupil may practise what is 
preached to him, and grow in skill and in real power over his 
own thoughts as well as in mere knowledge. In short, a 
brief course in systematic rhetoric, as well as in systematic 
grammar, will, under ordinary circumstances and at the pres- 
ent time, be found of practical service in the teaching of 
English. 

If, then, we assume that it will ordinarily be convenient to 
give high school pupils some little instruction in systematic 

rhetoric as well as in systematic grammar, it 
When shaU . . , J . , . , 

Rhetoric be remains to point out the time at which such 

instruction can most profitably be given. On this 
point most teachers would probably agree in thinking the 
second year the most fitting. The pupil has then completed 
his course in systematic grammar, he has had work in English 
literature and some practice in composition ; he is now at 
home in his new environment, his powers of observation and 
reasoning have begun to grow rapidly, and he is already more 
of a young man than a boy. It is high time that, for half a 
year or so, he should have a little plain and kindly systematic 
instruction in the theory of written expression. If this be 
given him, he will be able to continue his practice in com- 
position throughout the course without other instruction, 
unless, as may seem wise, pupils who are not going to college 
should be allowed to take, during their final year, a somewhat 
elaborate course in composition, in which case some slight 
further instruction in theory might then be added. 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 223 

The subject-matter of school rhetoric has been so thoroughly 
and sensibly discussed by American teachers dur- What shall 
ing the last ten years that it is not difficult briefly *e Taught? 
to indicate what seem to be the general conclusions. They 
are : — 

(1) That the older method, descended from Blair and 
Campbell, of teaching dogmatically somewhat pedantic 
theories as to purity, propriety, and precision (not to mention 
perspicuity) and of elaborately analyzing and classifying 
multitudinous figures of speech, is valueless and is being 
rapidly discarded. 

(2) That the succeeding method, which laid great stress 
on formal correctness, is also of doubtful or limited value. 
Systematic rhetoric may help the pupil to acquire the habit 
of correct expression, just as systematic grammar may also be 
of service to him in the same direction, but it cannot be his 
only help or his main help. He will be aided chiefly by the 
conversation he hears, by the example of his teacher and 
fellows, and by the knowledge of standard English which he 
gains from his study of English literature. 

(3) That, therefore, the best method is one which, while 
not neglecting the study of correctness, lays most stress on the 
study of construction in the larger sense of the word, — the 
building up of a complete idea through a series of sentences 
or paragraphs. 1 

What has already been said about divided usage in sys- 
tematic grammar will apply equally well to rhetoric, though 
in rhetoric the problems involved are more numer- Divided Usage 
ous and more perplexing. In some hundreds of ^ Rhetoric. 
cases, many of them of frequent occurrence in oral and 



1 We should not leave the subject without calling attention to two 
other points : (1) that a system or method does not make the use of a 
text-book indispensable, provided that the teacher has his own method 
clearly and definitely in mind ; and (2) that in the teaching of rhetoric 
American teachers are greatly in advance of other countries. Through- 
out Europe the subject is almost invariably taken up according to the 
methods prevalent at the end of the last century. 



224 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

written expression, the usage of intelligent, educated, English- 
speaking people differs, — somewhat more than one-half, let 
us say, uttering or writing one word or phrase and somewhat 
less than one half another. In olden days, when correctness 
was the aim of all linguistic instruction, it was the invariable 
practice of teachers, often on very slight authority, to pro- 
nounce one of these twin expressions " correct " and the 
other " incorrect." With our changed notions regarding 
language and propriety, we now feel this practice to be un- 
scientific, and agree to call one expression " preferable " to 
the other on grounds of taste and analogy, or perhaps to 
recognize both as equally current. On the other hand, there 
is no doubt a general feeling among teachers that this theory 
is objectionable, first, because some one thing must be 
" right ; " second, because it makes the task of the teacher 
so much harder, inasmuch as he himself is constantly at a 
loss to decide between variants ; and, third, because the 
pupil may come to believe that he can say or write almost 
anything without fear of error. These pleas are, however, 
easily met. First, no one thing must be " right " in matters 
of custom ; second, the teacher must be prepared to face 
the facts, whether the task be hard or easy ; and, third, the 
pupil can feel assured that he cannot be justly reproached 
for employing expressions that are used by the most in- 
telligent people with whom he comes into contact. 

The whole subject is one deserving careful discussion. 
Three points, however, may be stated, which represent the 

deliberate opinion of the present writer : — 
The same . 

Subject (i) It seems wise to accept without reserve the 

Continued. , . ...... 

modern doctrine of divided usage, and to explain 

carefully to pupils that the real arbiter of correctness is the 
practice of intelligent and educated people, and that when, as 
often happens, usage differs, each speaker or writer can, with- 
out fear of being "incorrect" or "wrong," use either of the 
parallel forms. 

(2) But it is important that pupils should understand that 
taste is an essential element in this choice, and that therefore 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 225 

they should endeavour by training their own taste in language 
to render their choice, in cases of divided usage, one made 
not at random but in accordance with the dictates of cultivated 
instinct and good judgment. 

(3) We all acknowledge that every publishing or printing 
house, and every school, class, or other group of individuals, 
has a right to decide, for purposes of convenience, on the use 
of one rather than another expression in cases of divided usage. 
Each school or teacher is advised to follow this practice. It 
will save endless discussion and, perhaps, bad feeling, and with 
it will disappear the plea that pupils suffer from bewilderment 
in not knowing " which is right." 

(4) Care should be taken in the selection of a text-book, if 
one is used, that it be not unscientifically dogmatic on points 
of usage. It is unwise to allow a young student to acquire 
ideas regarding language which his later experience must in- 
evitably show him to be unwise. 

From about 1885 t0 aD0Ut 1895, one °f tne most difficult 
problems relating to secondary work in English was that of the 
part played in systematic rhetoric by the correction «Bad" 
of "bad" English, i. e., ungrammatical or unidio- systematic* 1 
matic expressions. At that time the text-books R^* 0110 - 
most in use concerned themselves largely with exercises of 
this kind, many colleges made a point of including such tests 
in their entrance examinations, and the current theory was 
that the careless habits of American boys in matters of ex- 
pression could best be reached in this way. During the 
last few years, however, the problem has in the main disap- 
peared and may practically be regarded as settled. There 
was right on both sides. The young must learn to express 
themselves decently and intelligently, and setting them to cor- 
rect their 6wn errors or those of others is often a considerable 
help. But to concentrate all or a greater part of secondary 
instruction on this negative process defeats, to some degree, 
the purpose involved. Text- books and systems of instruction 
now wisely give most attention to questions of structure, to the 
general method of composition, taking it mainly for granted 

r 5 



226 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

that the teacher will by various means and on all occasions 
insist on the use of correct English, — without pedantry, — 
and that the pupil will be led on all sides, and especially 
through his reading and study of literature and through his 
practice in oral or written composition, to acquire skill in the 
proper use of his native language. The old method, however, 
is still valuable on occasion and to a limited extent, and, in 
the case of pupils unfamiliar with good English idiom or 
resolutely neglectful of it, may often for a time be regularly 
employed with good results. 

The following hints as to method may also be of service : — 
(i) It is well to cover the ground as rapidly as possible. 
Rhetoric is useful only as an advisable preparation for corn- 
Hints as position, just as certain parts of algebraic theory 
to Method. are f use on ]y as necessary preliminaries to the 
solution of equations. Once it is clear that a class understands 
a given principle there is no need of lingering further over it. 

(2) But it is important also to cover the ground thoroughly. 
The class must really understand the given principle before it 
is allowed to pass on. A few principles thoroughly understood 
will be of far greater service than a large number which are 
only imperfectly comprehended. 

(3) If we regard systematic rhetoric as a sort of extension 
of systematic grammar, it will readily be seen that it may be of 
considerable value as a means of mental discipline. The sys- 
tems used may vary, but whichever one is* chosen may be with 
advantage taught as a system, a theory in which all the parts 
are related one to the other in a given way. Emphasis on 
rhetoric as a system, instead of a mere fortuitous assemblage 
of rules, will assist the student, provided the system is suffi- 
ciently sound and simple, and make the drill more rapid, more 
interesting, and more useful. 

The formal study of rhetoric must, however, like the formal 
study of grammar, be regarded as merely the beginning of the 
Supplemen- task. If the pupil ceases constantly to use it in 
tary study, connection with his other work in English, he is 
little the better off. In the case of rhetoric also, as in that of 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 227 

grammar, the main fault of American instruction is that it too 
often fails to make use of opportunities for supplementary 
training. These are offered in abundance by the work in com- 
position, where the pupil can apply constantly the system in 
which he has been trained, and by the work in literature, 
where his attention should, during the second and third years, 
be frequently called to points relating to the choice of words 
and to the grouping of words, sentences, and paragraphs. In 
rhetoric, too, as in the theory of any of the arts, it must not 
be forgotten that the essential principles cannot be mastered 
at once. Even when clearly apprehended at first, they take 
new forms and gather new meanings as the learner's experience 
broadens and as his taste and judgment mature. Systematic 
rhetoric — to use the pedantic term — is thus merely the begin- 
ning of a study of the principles of expression which will con- 
tinue through life, under one form or another, and can never 
be regarded as completed. 

The course which we have outlined for the first term of the 
second year deals only with the structure of expression, — 

with the choice of words and their grouping in 

, ■ . m . & , . A Second 

sentences and larger units. Ihe theory here in- Course in 

volved will be quite sufficient for the pupil's needs 
in connection with his work in composition and literature dur- 
ing the remainder of the second year and the whole of the 
third year. At the beginning of the fourth year a different 
situation arises. It is the last year of education for many 
pupils, and it is only just that they should use it to the best 
advantage. They have now more maturity and more ambition, 
and their composition work becomes more spontaneous. They 
need training in description, narration, exposition, and argument. 
Here the same reasoning as that which we have outlined in the 
case of systematic grammar and of elementary rhetoric points to 
the setting aside of a few weeks or months for a theoretical treat- 
ment of the subjects mentioned. The teacher may, indeed, 
prefer merely to give a few incidental hints for the student's 
guidance in connection with his essays, or to develop a theory 
inductively in connection with the work in literature. But 



228 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

either method is only in rare instances satisfactory : the dan- 
ger of the first is that the pupil will get merely scattered hints, 
and hence be unable in after years to judge his own writing or 
that of others ; the danger of the second is that he will get not 
only scattered ideas but misleading ideas, owing to the lack of 
a broad basis for induction furnished by the few works of litera- 
ture read. 

Several hints may be of service in connection with an ad- 
vanced or fourth year course in systematic rhetoric : — 

(i) It is wise to avoid subtle distinctions as to 
Method.in \ \ . , , . . TT 

Advanced methods of narration and description. Very few 

such methods and principles will stand careful and 

sane analysis. All the theory that any one needs to know about 

either narration or description is exceedingly small in amount, 

and can be easily presented to an intelligent class in a few 

hours. Exposition is obviously the kind of writing which the 

student will use most and in which he needs the most careful 

drill. 

(2) The detailed study of argument is too difficult for pupils 
at this period. The process of proof, to be sure, they have 
been familiar with, in various forms, for several years, partic- 
ularly through algebra, geometry, and the natural sciences ; but 
the proof of any proposition of any weight in connection with 
history, economics, or literature involves a broad knowledge of 
facts and principles which it is impossible for the high school 
pupil to possess. The main advantage of the study of argu- 
mentation in the high school is thus, as an able secondary 
teacher remarks, that the pupil becomes conscious of the ex- 
treme difficulty of complete and scientific proof, and of his own 
inability to prove propositions of any complexity. Pursued in 
this spirit, the study is a valuable part of the student's training. 

(3) As in the case of the elementary course in rhetoric and 
the systematic course in grammar, much depends upon the 
previous work of the pupil and upon his supplementary work. 
His mind must have been prepared by much incidental instruc- 
tion, during the work of the second and third years in compo- 
sition and in literature ; and the training given in the advanced 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 229 

course in systematic rhetoric must be supplemented, while it 
is being given and after it has ceased, by work both in litera- 
ture and in composition. 

In connection with the discussion of formal rhetoric a 
moment's attention should be given to the old practice of 
requiring the systematic memorizing of definitions 
establishing distinctions between words meaning 
much the same thing, together with exercises in framing sen- 
tences involving the proper use of such words. It is much to 
be doubted whether this training was of any value whatsoever. 
Definitions of words apart from any context are not only very 
dull but very unsatisfactory. It is important that young people 
should learn these distinctions. It is not necessary, however, 
to give such instruction in a fashion that runs counter to the 
known laws of mental activity. The proper place for learning 
the exact meaning of words is in connection with the regular 
work in literature and in composition. In the former the 
teacher will do his best to make sure that the pupil under- 
stands the force of each word and its shade of meaning, 
and in the second he may encourage him constantly to broaden 
his vocabulary by the appropriate use of such new words. 

No other subject of school instruction, certainly no other 
subject in the field of English, is so important as composition. 
Other subjects are means to an end. We pursue 
them in order that the mind may be stimulated to an Essential 
healthful activity, or may accumulate the material u jec ' 
on which it will work when trained and roused to activity. 
Composition, however, is itself an activity or the sign of an 
activity. Through it we may determine the amount of dynamic 
power possessed by the student, the extent to which it has 
been developed, the character and substance of the informa- 
tion which he has acquired, and the degree to which he is lord 
over it. It is of great importance, therefore, that the teacher 
should discuss with care the various problems relating to the 
work in composition, in order that it may in every way possible 
be made effective. 



230 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

As we have seen, composition was until recently not an im- 
portant element in secondary instruction. Within the last 

twenty years, however, it has made great strides 
Shall there be J . J ' to 

a Teacher of forward. At the present time the teacher of 
Composition? „..,.. , . . . 

English is, in many cases, chosen largely on the 

basis of his skill in teaching composition, and " English " in 
the curriculum often means scarcely more than English com- 
position. The teacher of composition has thus become an 
exceedingly strong influence in secondary instruction. Broad- 
minded, well-balanced, sympathetic, eager to learn and to 
teach, quick to read character and skilful in training his pupils 
in power of observation and reasoning, he — or more often 
she — has won the respect and affection of the whole school 
community. But the question may very properly be put, — 
and has been very strongly put by Dr. Samuel Thurber, — Is 
it the business of any one teacher to give instruction in com- 
position ? Is it not rather the duty and privilege of all ? 

" What I must say here is that the special teacher of com- 
position should be abolished. He does no good, and he 
stands in the way. The reading of a certain limited amount 
of juvenile writing for purposes of correction is a pleasing task, 
leading to personal relations, to an appreciation of individual 
difficulties, to a possible giving of wise counsel. But the read- 
ing of juvenile writing in great quantities is inconsistent with 
mental and physical health. All the teachers of a school should 
share equally this task of supervising this English writing. I 
do not see how any teacher, man or woman, can have the ef- 
frontery to claim to know good English better than the rest ; 
and I do not see how any teacher can submit to have the 
drudgery of having several times his share of this work thrust 
upon him." 1 

Dr. Thurber's plan, consistent as it is in many respects with 
the best educational theory, is a counsel of perfection. In 
the ideally constituted, frictionless school machine it would 
be possible and advisable. Nay, more, it is a device that can 



1 Samuel Thurber, " Five Axioms of Composition Teaching," School 
Review, January, 1897. 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 23 1 

in certain rare institutions be already put into practice ; if 
adopted in small colleges, under skilful administration, it might 
there work wonders. But it can scarcely be seri- yes; at 
ously considered to-day by the rank and file of Fresent * 
secondary schools throughout the country, for three reasons. 
First, what is everybody's business is nobody's business. The 
proper results would — through indifference, indolence, or 
sheer lack of time and strength on the part of teachers and 
pupils — simply not be secured at all. Second, there is, sad 
to say, good reason for believing that in far too many cases 
some teachers do use better English than others, and that a 
great number do not use good English at all. Third, even if all 
teachers were equal in this capacity, all would scarcely be equal 
in the peculiar characteristics that distinguish the good teacher 
of composition. Indeed, this special work can often not be 
entrusted even to the teacher of English literature, who knows 
and teaches his branch of the subject thoroughly, but who fre- 
quently cannot somehow succeed in getting boys and girls to 
write well. 

Therefore, reluctantly agreeing that work in composition 
must be under the charge of a special teacher, we pass to the 
consideration of a necessary corollary, What help Aid from 
in the field of composition can the teacher of 0utslde - 
English get from his colleagues? Here we are on more solid 
ground. Three points at once suggest themselves : 

(1) The teachers in a secondary school should by solemn 
compact bind themselves to foster in every way the use of 
good English in all classrooms. Under this agreement they 
would discourage slovenly or incorrect pronunciation and slip- 
shod expression, and would absolutely decline to receive 
papers in which errors in spelling, punctuation, and grammar 
are conspicuous, or to approve oral recitations in which the 
English is plainly bad. 1 Further, they would, in the inter- 



1 This is again a counsel of perfection. But much can be done in this 
way if teachers are only willing to do as much as they can. The dangers 
are: (1) that teachers will not take the trouble to meet together and dis- 



232 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

ests of their own subjects, help their pupils to acquire the 
priceless habit of accurate statement. 

(2) Much can be done for composition by means of the 
prolonged oral recitation, — the topical recitation. Pupils are 
too much inclined to get along, if they can, by saying yes or 
no, or uttering little scraps of information, sure of being 
prodded or cajoled into giving the rest of the answer. A 
pupil who can speak for two or three moments, quietly and 
clearly, on a given topic, has a real command over his knowl- 
edge and his faculties. 

(3) The writing of exercises, summaries, and essays on 
subjects lying outside the field of English may also be turned 
to good account. But here also we must step with caution. 
There is real danger that the pupil will have too much writing 
to do, which is almost worse than none at all. On this matter 
teachers should consult each other, agreeing on a stated sched- 
ule, so that the poor beast of burden may not be so outra- 
geously overweighted as to make no real progress. Nor is it 
clear that the teacher of composition should have any share in 
the correction of papers written for other departments. That 
will depend upon circumstances. Other things being equal, 
each department can best attend to its own exercises. All 
that is important is that the department of English should 
keep on good terms with its sister departments, and that all 
should agree on the amount of work thus required and on the 
standards to be used in judging it. 

It is to be doubted whether young people can safely be 
talked to about " style." Scientifically speaking, 
every writer has his habits of expression, which dif- 
fer only in slight particulars from those of his fellows. From 



cuss the matter carefully, to see just what they had best do; (2) that, 
because the pressure of time keeps them from doing all they want to do, 
they will decline to dp anything ; and (3) that some teachers who have 
hard and fast (and perhaps unscientific) ideas as to what is " correct " 
will strain over the minute and unimportant errors in idiom and let slip 
the opportunity to scotch the really vicious practices of thought and 
speech. 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 233 

the artistic point of view style is a highly specialized set of 
habits in composition, such as are acquired only by an indi- 
vidual either of considerable maturity or endowed with unusual 
talent in matters of expression. Young people rarely have any 
such highly specialized habits of expression, nor is it desirable 
that they should try to acquire them. The duty of the teacher 
is to see that they write plainly and clearly and naturally, — 
that is all. Nor is it wise to talk to them much about the 
" style " of great authors. They should be helped to enjoy 
the special charm of various pieces of literature, but for this 
purpose very little detailed analysis is necessary. Indeed, 
little detailed analysis of an author's style is possible until 
psychology has made further advances. 

The peculiar linguistic training to be obtained from transla- 
tion has been often vaunted, and no doubt there is much that 

is sound in the laudation. But there are several 
....,, . . . . Translation. 

limitations that detract from the merits of transla- 
tion as a secondary exercise in English. First, the whole 
element of structure is absent. The pupil must follow some 
one else's thought, and, generally speaking, cannot depart 
from the order of statement employed in the original. Second, 
the pupil must not, in a school exercise in translation, vary 
much from a literal version. It is the classical master's busi- 
ness to see that the foreign original — in its construction — is 
felt through the English version, whereas to translate well, into 
English that is thoroughly idiomatic, is frequently to weave 
together the elements of thought so differently that the transla- 
tion is a re-creation of the matter in a form often strangely 
diverse. This practical necessity of rendering literally is 
strikingly apparent in so-called translations at sight, written for 
examination purposes, where no sane youth would dream of 
writing anything but a sort of English parallel or facsimile 
of the foreign original. Third, the task is one in which judg- 
ment, maturity of mind, and reflection play a large part. The 
boy of sixteen has rarely the intellectual power to do work 
requiring such careful introspection, such minute consideration 
of Ihe associations connected with words, such deliberate dis- 



234 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

crimination. With these disadvantages in mind, the teacher 
of English, while encouraging translation, will make but a 
guarded use of it in secondary as distinguished from college 
instruction. 

As to the work that falls directly within the field of com- 
position writing, we have first to ask ourselves how much, how 
often, may the secondary student be expected to 

Composition write. Here opinions differ widely, but I am 
Writing? m r J ' 

convinced that : — 

(i) He should certainly write no more than the teacher 
has time to read. 1 At least the opposite method should never 
be adopted except for reasons of solid weight, and then only 
in the case of mere exercises. 

(2) He should certainly write no more than he can write 
well. Even for a mature person a few hundred words a day 
is a good average, if he has thinking to do before and while 
he writes, and other things to attend to. Composition is not 
a trick of the hand, but the most delicate act of mental balance 
and control. To the boy the writing of two hundred words 
often seems like a labour of Hercules. And it must be remem- 
bered that it is folly to force a growing boy to be fluent. Let 
him think a little, and compose a little, — just enough so that 
there is no inhibition, so that the habit grows with his increas- 
ing knowledge, self-consciousness, and self-control. Just how 
much this should be each teacher must find out for himself 
with due regard to the existing circumstances. The pupil 
should have some writing to do every day ; he should do it 
with care and should be judged by it. But this need not be a 
" daily theme " — a burden proper only for broader shoulders, 2 
— but a simple exercise, based usually on some one of his 
school duties and usually designed for another teacher. For 
the composition specifically required by his English teacher, 
once a week will usually be often enough. 



1 See Samuel Thurber, "Elementary Composition in High Schools," 
The [Syracuse] Academy, November, 1889. 

2 See Samuel Thurber, " Five Axioms of Composition Teaching," 
School Review, 1897, V. 14. 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 2$$ 

The question of the relation between written composition 
and literature is a perplexing matter, and must be solved by 
each instructor according to his own experience Topics from 
and in connection with his own methods and gen- literature, 
eral policy. Many successful teachers hold that composition 
should be kept in such close relations with the work in litera- 
ture as to be almost, if not quite, a subdivision of it, basing 
their theory on the ground that the works read in the course 
in literature serve naturally, not only as the student's inspira- 
tion, but as his models. Though it is not to be doubted that 
appreciative reading will be a constant source of inspiration to 
the student and a natural and proper stimulus, it may be 
objected, on the other hand, that masterpieces of literature are 
scarcely normal models for high school students. 1 Master- 
pieces are the work of men, not of boys, — and of men of 
genius at that. The youth can in many instances understand 
and appreciate them, he can be stimulated by them, but, even 
when the masterpiece belongs to the period in which he is 
living, he is rarely if ever fitted, physically or psychologically, 
to treat himself a subject of anything like the same sort in a 
style even remotely similar. A boy is a boy, and to a. boy 
belong a boy's subjects and a boy's style. In the opinion of 
the present writer, therefore, it would be certainly possible, 
though scarcely advisable, to teach a boy to write thoroughly 
well without requiring him to make in any way a study of 
English literature, — perhaps, in an extreme case, without 
reading books at all. Provided that he is supplied with a 
fairly good vocabulary, whether by reading or by conversation, 
or by both, he can be so trained, during his school days, by 
practice, correction, and criticism, as to be able to express his 
own ideas in a rational and sensible manner, precisely as, 
under good instruction, a boy could learn to draw really well 



1 As my collaborators remind me, I must not fail to state that what I 
say applies only to the use of literature as a model. It is natural that 
subjects for compositions should often be taken from English literature, — 
summaries, criticisms, and the like, — though I do not believe that it is 
wise to use such subjects exclusively or more than to a moderate degree. 



236 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

by attempting, under such guidance and correction, one tan- 
gible object after another, without ever having seen or studied 
the work of a great artist. Certainly, by availing ourselves of 
the inspiration that must inevitably come from the proper 
reading and study of literature, we can give high school 
students — and, for that matter, college students — the very 
best training in composition without letting them stray far 
away from the subjects most suitable to their age and experi- 
ence. It is not, then, in my opinion, wise to attempt to corre- 
late too closely the course of study in literature and that in 
composition. The student must depend on literature for much 
of his general stimulus and often for specific hints. The sub- 
jects for essays may, too, frequently be taken from topics in 
literature just as from topics in history. But it should not be 
forgotten that the main object in view is to train the pupil 
in the art of expressing his own thoughts and not those of 
another, and that this means, in the case of a high school 
pupil, that he must be taught how to think consciously and 
logically, and how to express clearly these conscious and 
logical thoughts. The secret of good teaching in this respect 
lies in letting the pupil always feel that he is handling thoughts 
that are genuinely his, or that are essentially of his sort, not 
the thoughts of an older person or of another epoch. 1 

If the question as to the taking of subjects mainly from the 
work in English literature be regarded as settled, the teacher 

will scarcely find much further difficulty as to sub- 
Choice of ,_, . . „ . 
Subjects jects. Ihe text-books all make many suggestions, 

and the life of the school community is so rich 

that the instructor, once committed to the policy of letting 

boys write on what they are actually thinking about or are 

glad to be thinking about, will find himself swept briskly along 

by a powerful and vital current. Experience has shown that, 

even in the public schools of large cities, the pupils from 

homes where refinement does not enter are not thereby at a 



1 See the admirable essay of Samuel Thurber, " Composition Topics," 
The [Syracuse] Academy, October, 1890. 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 237 

disadvantage as regards the material of their essays, for, like 

their more cultivated fellows, and even more than they, they 

can draw at will from a multitude of interesting trades and 

handicrafts, and from the stimulating sights and incidents that 

make up the life of a great city. 

Two special forms of composition, — paraphrasing and 

verse writing, — as to the value of which there has been 

much dispute, may be conveniently taken up 

1 • r™ • 1 • 1 Paraphrasing, 

at this point, lhe case against paraphrasing has 

been most strongly stated by Dr. Laurie, whose attack we 

quote in full : — 

" To facilitate the full comprehension of difficult sentences 
and paragraphs, the exercise came into general use in this 
country [Scotland] about twenty-five years ago. paraphrasing 
Paraphrasing consists in the turning into common- Attacked, 
place language, which ' any fellow may understand,' the verse 
of a poet, or the succinct prose of such writers as Bacon and 
Browne, or the luxuriant paragraphs of Jeremy Taylor. A 
more detestable exercise I do not know. It is a vile use of 
pen and ink. One would, of course, submit to it as an un- 
happy necessity were there no other way of showing that we 
understand an author. But this is far from being the case. 
To paraphrase Milton or Shakspere is to turn the good into the 
inferior or the bad, and to degrade literature. Moreover, it is 
false. For the youth who has done it imagines that his bald 
sentences give all that is to be found in the original passage of 
Milton or Bacon. If this were so, then there would, alas ! be 
no such thing as literature, no such thing as Art in language. 
When all is done, you have no longer got Bacon or Milton, 
but only your much lesser self. This exercise is based on a 
misunderstanding of the whole situation. Teachers were 
vaguely groping for some means of assuring themselves that 
their pupils really saw their way through the organism of a 
piece of poetry, — terse, elliptical, and frequently inverted in 
the or do verborum. But this object can quite well be obtained 
by a process which might be called ' Resolution,' or, to please 
those fond of big words, ' Dialysis.' It simply consists in the 
writing out of the piece of poetry in grammatical prose order, 
supplying words understood, but always pre 'serving 'the language 
of the poet. This prevents a boy from contenting himself 



238 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

with that vague knowledge which is not knowledge at all, but 
mere impression supported by dim, disconnected images, or, it 
may be, by the mere musical rhythm of language. It compels 
him to be exact, and may, perchance, startle him for the first 
time into the perception that poets, after all, talk plain sense, 
and may thus awaken his critical faculties. To shut the book 
and try to express the substance of the thought of a prose 
writer in your own words, is an excellent exercise, but this is 
not l paraphrasing ' as commonly practised." 1 

In direct opposition to Dr. Laurie's views are those of Mr. 
H. C. Bowen. " 'Paraphrasing,' " he says, "is the unpacking 
Paraphrasing an( ^ exhibiting clearly and at large of the whole 
Defended. meaning of a passage which, in the author in ques- 
tion, is expressed in a brief and condensed or figurative form, 
or perhaps, at times, rather suggested than expressed. It re- 
quires in the pupil a knowledge of the real force of the allu- 
sions, and of the bearing of the passage as a whole on its 
context, and the occasion on which it is used. It requires an 
appreciation of the exact force and intention of the metaphors, 
similes, and epithets, and a consciousness of that associated 
meaning or colour which certain words and phrases acquire, 
and which are brought out most distinctly in the contrasts 
between so-called synonyms. It is only when this knowledge 
of, this insight into, what the author desires to convey to us 
has been sought for and gained, that we are in a position to 
truly appreciate, and really delight in, the art and beauty of 
his mode of expression. To ascertain whether our pupils 
have gained this knowledge and insight we must require 
them to tell us what the passage has told them. This 
exercise in giving outward expression to the thoughts and 
feelings which they have made their own is of great value 
educationally." 2 

Paraphrasing is not a common exercise in our secondary 
schools, and the whole system is one of theoretical rather than 



1 Lectures on Language and Linguistic Method in the School, p. 52. 

2 English Literature Teaching in Schools, London, 1 891, p. 32. 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 239 

practical importance. It is, however, so frequently brought 

up for discussion that it is of importance that teachers 

should have clear ideas about it. The gist of 

Summary, 
the matter seems to be as follows : — 

(1) As Dr. Laurie says, there is no sense in requiring a 
paraphrase into bald English of beautiful and intricate pas- 
sages in prose and verse if the pupil gets the impression that 
his bald version is really the equivalent of the original. It 
would be better, as Dr. Laurie suggests, to require in its place 
— if it is necessary to make sure that the original is under- 
stood — a sort of construing that, using the words of the 
original, would indicate the ordinary prose construction. 

(2) But, as Dr. Laurie himself acknowledges, there would 
sometimes be a distinct advantage in asking a pupil to express 
in his own words his understanding of a difficult or intricate 
prose passage, keeping his book closed meanwhile. If so, it 
is hard to see why the process would not be equally helpful in 
dealing with a similar poetical passage, and why, provided the 
pupil still gave his own impressions in his own words, his book 
might not as well be open as shut. 

(3) The point really at issue, therefore, is whether, inas- 
much as a considerable part of the effect produced by poetry 
or beautiful prose must be analogous to that produced by 
music and hence not translatable into words, it is well to en- 
courage any attempt to render the impressions produced by 
such passages into plain English. 

But there is obviously an intellectual or logical substratum 
for even delicate aesthetic impressions, and it is of value to the 
pupil that he be taught clearly to recognize this element in 
literature, and, further, that he be encouraged to express in 
his own words whatever he feels or knows. On this basis, 
it seems evident that those in favour of paraphrase have 
won their case, though, on the other hand, it is equally 
evident that the exercise is mainly to be used in direct 
connection with the work of literature, that it may most often 
be carried on orally, and that, like analysis or parsing, it 
should not be continued, except at intervals, after the pupil 



240 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

has learned to perform unconsciously the process of under- 
standing which it aims to cultivate. 

With regard to verse writing there is less to be said, for the 
question has not reached the stage of general and public dis- 
Verse cussion. Within the last few years a considerable 

Writing. number of secondary teachers have found that they 
could interest their pupils in verse writing, and that, as a re- 
sult of such training, their pupils were often able to produce 
very creditable verse and showed, in addition, a more marked 
appreciation of English poetry. 1 Other teachers have made at- 
tempts in the same direction without much success, and many 
have doubted whether the exercise was feasible, unless in ex- 
ceptional cases. The consensus of opinion appears to be this : 

(i) Pupils must in some way learn to understand the 
mechanism of English verse. If this is presented to them 
systematically, as it perhaps should be, it is quite likely that 
they will be considerably aided in understanding it by trying 
themselves to write blank verse. This much may be regarded 
as fairly well established, both by practice and by general 
educational theory. 

(2) It would be unwise to ask all teachers and all classes 
to go further than this. But, when the teacher is himself 
interested in such work, it is highly advisable that he should 
try the experiment of requiring the whole class, at some 
appropriate time, to write several quatrains, some hexameters, 
and finally a sonnet. He will perhaps be surprised to find 
that many pupils succeed in doing their tasks well, and that 
even those who were previously insensible to rhythm and 
rhyme begin now to get a distinct sense of what the pleasure 
is which poetry gives, and are stimulated, if not to further 
writing, at least to further reading. It is not necessary or 
desirable that every man and woman should write verses, but 
it is desirable that every man and woman should love poetry, 
and a little verse writing in youth may prove one of the most 
efficient aids to this end. 



1 Chubb, The Teaching of English, Chapter XVIII. 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 24 1 

(3) So far all the class may go. Those who show ability 
may go further, if more important tasks do not prevent. 
Especially in the case of students not going to college it would 
be wise, in connection with the last year's work in composi- 
tion, to give an opportunity, from time to time, for the writing 
not of doggerel parody but of unaffected and sincere verse. 

In the process of essay writing, it should be noticed, the 

teacher has his share. The audience, the miniature public 

which the pupil addresses, is the class, or, on rare 

, The Process 
occasions perhaps, the whole school. The teacher of Essay 

Writing, 
is the counsellor of the author, the protector of 

the public. He approves the subject as one likely to interest 

the little community; he helps the author in his search for 

material, and at need in his arrangement of it \ but he also 

guards the public from boredom, refusing to accept in its 

behalf the illiterate or carelessly composed or vulgar essay. It 

is a mistake or a misfortune to think of the teacher's work as 

beginning only when the essay is handed in. It may, indeed, 

if his method has been well thought out and his counsel good, 

be almost wholly completed. 

It is a mistake, too, for the teacher to allow himself to be 
thought of as an unscientific and unlearned person who 
merely knows " how to say things." He is instead The Teacher 
an expert in adolescence. Himself mature, broad- tfon°as an 1 * 
minded, well read, he has not entirely put away Ex P ert - 
his sympathy with the young. He understands them, knows 
when to repress and when to stimulate, of what is the sub- 
stance of their thought, and how their minds may wisely be 
led to subjects worthy of permanent interest. This delicate, 
inspiring, tactful influence may well be the most important 
factor in their development. He owes himself, therefore, 
some self-esteem, for his place is hard to fill. 

With regard to the correction of essays, the instructor of 

experience will need no advice, but the teacher who is just 

entering on the duties of his profession will, perhaps, be glad 

of a few hints. 

16 



242 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

(i) The reading and correction of essays, and the sub- 
sequent conferences on them with pupils, form by far the 
TheCorrec- m o st important part of your work. Take pains, 
tion of Essays, therefore, to perform such duties with the utmost 
thoroughness. Insist that pupils shall present their manuscripts 
at the time designated, and in the form prescribed. Do not 
waste your time in reading essays on which the pupil has put 
little time or thought. Mark such essays zero, and it is not 
likely that the pupil will repeat the experiment. Insist, so far 
as possible, that sufficient time be given you for reading essays 
with proper care, and for a proper amount of conference on 
them with students, either individually or in small groups. Give 
to the task of reading and correction, so far as possible, your 
best or freshest hours, either early in the morning or just 
after invigorating exercise. The practice of reading essays 
by artificial light, or when jaded, is usually injurious, both 
physically and professionally. 

(2) When reading essays, make yourself as comfortable as 
possible, and take measures to guard yourself against in- 
The First terruption. You are engaged in an important 
Process. professional duty, and it is necessary that you 

should have all your faculties in good working order. With 
regard to each essay, there are two things to be considered. 
First, has the pupil used correct English? Second, has he 
given to his thought full, clear, and well-balanced expression? 
The best way, as a rule, is to read each essay twice. The first 
reading should be for correctness. Mark each error in spelling, 
punctuation, etc., as you read, provided that the errors are of 
such a kind that the pupil can fairly be supposed to be 
acquainted with the proper form. In the early stages of 
composition work, be careful not to bewilder the pupil by 
calling his attention to errors the consideration of which 
properly belongs to a later stage in his training. If there 
are many errors, the teacher should not go further, and the 
essay should be returned for rewriting. 

So far the teacher's task has been largely mechanical, but 
he has as yet performed merely his preliminary and more 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 243 

elementary office. If, in the case of essays which are in the 
main correctly written, he stops here, he is as likely to have 
done harm as good, for he has left untouched The Second 
the most important point, — has the pupil got hold Process « 
of a definite idea and given to that idea a sufficiently full, 
clear, and well-balanced expression ? If he has, he should 
be praised. If he has not, he should be shown how and why. 
But this should be done, if possible, by word of mouth and not 
by writing. In this second reading, then, the teacher's task 
calls for good judgment, an insight into what young people 
may with reason be expected to know, and much skill in 
seizing the hazy thought which the boy actually had in mind, 
and in drawing him on, little by little, to see the steps by 
which that thought can be well expressed. Be sure, finally, 
not to give a high mark, under ordinary circumstances, to an 
essay in which the writer has not honestly striven to give 
expression to some real thought of his own. Good thinking 
expressed in incorrect language must not be tolerated, but 
neither must correct language without good thinking. 1 

(3) Avoid sarcasm and irritable comments. Keep your 
sense of humour wakeful, and be as kindly disposed towards 
your inferiors in skill as you would wish your superiors to be 
towards you. 

(4) Don't be fussy or finicky. No two people write 
alike, and it would be abnormal for a youth to have the style 
of a person of mature years. The essential thing is that he 
shall have an idea, that he shall consciously strive to give 
that idea its best expression, and that in the process he shall 
not have overstepped the bounds of correct usage. 

(5) Teachers should feel that, in proportion as they do 
their work skilfully, they are experts, in precisely the same 
way and to precisely the same degree that trained teachers of 



1 Here is one of the great stumbling-blocks in practical instruction. 
Many a teacher can do excellent work on the more mechanical side, and 
succeed in getting his pupils to write clearly and correctly, who fails 
completely in getting them to express ideas which are other than the 
mere replica of what they have just heard or read. 



244 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

mathematics or chemistry are experts. To teach composition 
well, one must have scholarship, cultivation, good judgment, 
and ingenuity. 

(6) Teachers of composition are peculiarly prone, from 
the nature of their work, to discouragement and irritability. 
Don't try to do more than you can do well ; take plenty of 
exercise and sleep ; work hard while you do work, — and if 
you have had the proper training, you will surely do well. 
If you find your judgment growing confused while you are 
reading essays, stop and take some light exercise for five 
minutes or read an amusing book. 



IV. Language : Oral Composition 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

H. Corson. The Voice and Spiritual Education. Macmillan. 1897. 

The Aims of Literary Study. Macmillan. 1899. 
S. Thurber. How to Make the Study of Literature Interesting. School 

Review, September, 1898. 

It was a misfortune that, during a great part of the nine- 
teenth century, our secondary schools were so largely engaged 

in teaching dead learning. Knowledge was con- 
of Oral. ceived of as something acquired by the eye through 

books, independent of personal activity or experi- 
ment, to be retained in the memory as so much dead weight, 
and at need to be regurgitated in the form of written words. 
Educational theory and practice have in many respects changed 
our methods and our outlook, particularly in the natural sci- 
ences, where the laboratory has supplanted the text-book ; but 
there is danger that in the field of English we shall cling too 
closely to the old pedantic fashion, and, while throwing stress 
on written composition, the more unreal and lifeless form of the 
art, neglect oral composition, which is the art in its human and 
natural, in its least lifeless and mechanical shape. For, in the 
first place, it is a mistake to conceive of language as primarily 
written, of the real or standard language as expressed in visual 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 245 

symbols, and of speech as only an artificial, secondary, or de- 
rived form. Precisely the contrary is true. No study of lan- 
guage is scientific that is not based on the grouping of its 
sounds, on its uses on the lips of men. The grammar we study 
is too often confined merely to the more or less unnatural or 
literary language, and we often err in sending pupils to dic- 
tionaries and similar printed material, which are merely imper- 
fect works of reference, valuable mainly as rough and mechanical 
classifications of existing usage, — chiefly with regard to the 
written language, — when the great source of all such informa- 
tion, the primary facts of usage, the speech of the intelligent 
and the educated, is continually ringing in their dull ears. 
One great advantage of laying stress on oral composition, then, 
is that it tends to rivet the pupil's attention on the facts and 
usages of his native language in their most living and vital 
forms. In the second place, the pupil will be greatly helped 
in his work in written composition by such practice in oral 
composition as will ensure his conceiving of the latter as the 
normal or typical form of expression, so that he will write with 
the idea of how his words will sound (rather than how they 
look) constantly before him. In the third place, he will be 
helped in his study of literature, for, similarly, he will enrich 
his store of associations with English words and phrases, and, 
what is perhaps even more important, he will learn, through 
his studies in the control and management of the human voice, 
to give to what he reads a more varied and adequate expres- 
sion, and thereby, if the psychologists are right, to realize 
more keenly, by the very fact of possessing greater powers of 
physical utterance, the emotional value of literature. In the 
fourth place, oral composition is of practical importance. It is 
only a few who can influence the public by essays or written 
appeals ; many men and women — indeed almost all in whose 
lives social, political, or business affairs play any considerable 
part — influence their fellows by spoken words. In the Amer- 
ican republic of to-day, almost as much as in the Grecian 
republics of two thousand years ago, the acquiring of skill in 
speech is, for the active citizen, a duty and a necessity. 



2Ajo ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

The people at large, and particularly teachers, have unfor- 
tunately become somewhat prejudiced against elocution. We 
Elocution: mean by the term, nowadays, merely good habits 
Teacher Cial °^ physic^ utterance, but for a long while we per- 
Necessary? h a p S thought of it as a difficult and esoteric art, 
based on a metaphysics of its own ; and we were often encour- 
aged in this belief by " elocutionists," who seemed to be not as 
other men because they alone were master of the inner wisdom 
that led to such unnatural mouthing of words and such ab- 
normal gesticulations. But now that elocution is more rightly 
understood as the simple and useful art, based on the study of 
the human vocal organs, of clear and effective utterance, and 
the elocutionist merely the master who, himself carefully 
trained, teaches this art, the situation is entirely different and 
does not call for suspicion or prejudice. It is clear that 
secondary pupils should be trained in these matters. The 
first question is, Who shall train them ? In general and in the 
abstract, it is obvious that no special teacher should be neces- 
sary, precisely as in composition. We all — presumably — 
use our vocal organs properly and are thus fitted to teach 
others. Practically, however, as in the case of composition, 
some are better fitted than others for this task, inasmuch as the 
effective use of the voice is far less common than might be 
thought, and skill in teaching the art may also vary. It is 
wiser, therefore, for some one of the teaching staff — prefer- 
ably the English master — to make himself responsible for the 
whole matter, and for the other teachers to co-operate with 
him systematically in a task which is as much for their benefit 
as for his. Where a special teacher of singing is employed, 
he may also take the work in elocution, and in large school 
systems it is advisable to have a special instructor in voice- 
training who has no other duties. In this case he should 
know his business thoroughly. There is no form of meta- 
physics that has any bearing on the subject at all. The train- 
ing of the speaking voice and the training of the singing voice 
are precisely parallel. Both require scientific knowledge of 
physical facts, natural aptitude of ear and voice, and skill in 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 247 

teaching, but they have only the remotest connections with 
theoretical aesthetics, psychology, and philosophy. 

The results desired are exceedingly simple and have already 
been mentioned. They are merely that such of our men and 
women as have had the advantage of a high school The Results 
education shall be able to breathe properly, use Desired, 
their vocal organs properly, and have such control and range 
of voice as to be able to express appropriately various shades 
of meaning, whether in ordinary speech, in reading aloud, or 
in public discourse. We need such training sadly. Few men 
can speak to an audience so as to be heard fifty feet away, 
even with an unnecessary expenditure of breath and muscular 
effort ; few women breathe properly, and the shrill nasal voices 
of many of our young women, in marked contrast with their 
refinement, intelligence, and beauty, are absolutely unpardon- 
able. Such training as may be given in a secondary school 
will not cure all these faults in every case, but it will certainly 
do away with three-quarters of them, when teachers are earnest 
and thoughtful, and will help make life better worth living for 
us all. 

The practice of requiring each student to " declaim " before 
his class or the whole school, formerly much in vogue, is now 
apparently disappearing, and, for many reasons, 
the change is a mark of progress. The alleged 
advantages of the old system were (a) that it brought students 
together as a whole, in an exercise that concerned them all ; 
(3) that it trained the memory ; (V) that it gave an oppor- 
tunity for gaining control over the voice ; and (d) that it led 
the modest and the timid to overcome their dread of address- 
ing an audience and gave others useful experience in the same 
direction. On the other hand, it may properly be urged (a) 
that there are other equally appropriate occasions for the 
assembling of students as a whole ; {b) that the memory is 
sufficiently trained in other ways ; (V) that, unless supple- 
mented by careful training in elocution, declamation could 
have little effect on the control of the voice ; and (d) that the 
public ordeal was scarcely calculated to reassure the timid, — 



248 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

in short, that the time, effort, and trouble involved in the 
exercise were out of proportion to the benefits derived from it. 
It is certainly clear that almost all of the advantages which 
it was supposed to offer can be easily secured from the practice 
of reading aloud in the classroom, which is further made 
desirable by the fact that it does not tempt the pupil into an 
artificial, exaggerated, and gesticulatory form of delivery. If 
students have had, however, proper drill in elocution and 
sufficient practice in reading aloud, it can do them no harm, 
towards the end of their course, to give declamations or to 
read their own compositions before the whole school, and the 
experience will probably often be useful to them. 

For the old system of declamation may be substituted, in 
short, a less formal and more effective method, by which even 
Reading better results are obtained. The teacher of elocu- 

Aioud. t j on ^ oes k} s p art ^ or ^ t0 S p ea k more in accord- 

ance with what is likely to be the fact in the average school, 
the teacher of English, at a fairly early point in the course, 
gives to the entering class a sufficient number of sensible and 
thorough exercises in the management of the voice, and ex- 
plains to them the principles which must be borne in mind 
until their application becomes habitual. But the main ele- 
ment in the instruction we are discussing is simply reading 
aloud, practised in connection with the work in literature and 
in composition, — reading which shall be carried on regularly, 
week in and week out, year in and year out, throughout the 
course ; and which shall aim simply to be audible, natural, and 
expressive. If this plan be adopted, if no exercise in compo- 
sition or literature take place without at least one pupil's 
reading aloud with these objects in mind, the problem will be 
found to solve itself. Not only that : it will be apparent, 
unless all theory and experience be at fault, that the other 
branches of English study will be correspondingly benefited. 
We cannot read well without recognizing clearly the meaning 
and force of words and the structure of sentences and para- 
graphs. And, conversely, if we read well, we are sure not 
to be lacking in knowledge of grammar and in a grasp of 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 249 

literature, and we are likely to write much better than we 
otherwise should. 

In a well-arranged secondary course in English it is almost im- 
possible not to provide for a considerable amount of training in 
oral composition. Even in the elementary school, 0ral 
oral composition is the natural and proper prelimi- Composition, 
nary to written composition. In the high school it is equally im- 
portant that oral composition should not be pushed too far in 
the background, for speech — not writing — is the vital and 
essential form of language. All good teachers will encourage 
and demand topical recitations at frequent intervals, and teachers 
of English will be helped by fostering discussion and the free 
expression of opinion, within necessary limits, by advising 
pupils to get their materials for composition so thoroughly in 
mind, before writing their essays, that they can utter their 
thoughts freely and concisely, and by sometimes requiring 
them to do so. The students' own ambition will also further 
the end in view. They will have their literary societies, their 
debating societies. These the teacher will encourage warily, 
for they often waste time and breed affectation and the mere 
spouting of nonsense. Particularly must he be on his guard 
with reference to debating. Adolescents can go through the 
form of debate, but real debating, in which the truth is sought 
through rigid testing of evidence and sound induction and 
deduction, is beyond their stage of mental growth, and is as 
harmful to their immature minds as certain forms of athletics 
would be to their immature bodies. The more careful exposi- 
tion boys and girls do, the better for them ; and a dash of 
attempted argument from time to time may not be amiss. 
But if they must debate, let them act under the direction of 
some older and wiser head, who will lead them to simple 
subjects, and, even in these, take pains to make it evident that 
only under exceptional circumstances will they be able really 
to prove any proposition whatsoever. 



250 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 



Part II. — Literature in the Secondary Schools 

For the general bibliography, see the bibliographies prefixed to this 
chapter and to Chapter II. 

So many and so effective have been the justifications of 
the introduction of literature into the secondary course of 
study, 1 that the question may now be considered 
Established as fully answered. English literature is now, in 
all good secondary schools, a subject of good 
standing, having its share of time in the regular school 
program. The pre-eminence once given to the classics and 
mathematics has passed, and in many cases has been given to 
English literature. 

The doubts as to whether it can be taught are also ceasing, 
for the sufficient reason that it is taught in many schools with 
which can as g reat measure of success as are the other 
toe Taught, subjects, whether judged by its opportunities as a 
means of discipline, as a subject of information, or as a means 
of cultivating taste. The grounds on which its claims rest, — 
as a means of knowing life, as a source of the higher pleasures, 
and is worth as a f° rm °f training, and as an ethical force, are 
Teaching. the same as obtain in the elementary school, and 
have been discussed in the chapter devoted to that subject. 

The divergences of opinion with regard to its treatment 
in the secondary school are concerned with other matters : 
What Aspects w ^ tn tne questions how, how much, in what order, 
jectshtube and including what sorts of facts and ideas. In 
Taught ? no subject i s t h ere greater variety in the content 
and method of instruction than in literature. The personality 
of the teacher and the bent of the department of the university 
which gave him his training, the requirements of the various 



1 See especially Laurie, Hinsdale, and Corson, cited above, and the 
files of The Academy, The School Review, and The Educational 
Review . 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 2$l 

colleges as indicated in their entrance examinations, 1 the 
standards maintained by state systems, and the home life and 
previous reading of the pupils, all condition and determine 
the instruction. In fact, the subject is and must always remain 
not only one of the most vaguely defined, but one of those in 
which the personal element in teacher and pupil is most 
present and most valuable. For not only are aesthetics and 
the canons of criticism in a most unsettled state 3 2 but literature, 
being an art, is an expression of a personal point of view of 
the author, — is, in fact, his interpretation of a certain phase 
of life, — and deals with that class of phenomena regarding 
which it is most difficult and unsafe to dogmatize. Moreover, 
it must always be that the different aspects of literature will 
have different degrees of interest for different minds ; the 
aesthetic, the philosophical, the linguistic, or the historical may 
appeal to us with peculiar force. 

But no matter what our peculiar predilections may be, it is 
obvious that for pupils of the secondary schools the first thing 
in studying literature is to understand it and enjoy it. It is 
even held by many good teachers that this is also the last 
thing, — a position of considerable strength, provided the 
term "understand" is sufficiently comprehensive. 

It can rarely be assumed that the pupil at the beginning of 
his high school course thoroughly understands what he reads. 
No matter how good his previous instruction, he reads with im- 
perfect analytic powers, with a knowledge of words neither 
full nor exact, with a limited acquaintance in the fields from 
which literary allusions are drawn, and with an experience of 
life as yet far too narrow to give his reading full significance. 
His knowledge of literary form and his ability to perceive 
relations are slight. When he reads simple stories, like Silas 
Marner, he gets the story, the motives of the action, and the 



1 See Regents' Bulletin, Albany, June, 1897, by Richard Jones. 
• 2 See The Authority of Criticism by W. P. Trent; Literary Criticism 
by Gayley and Scott, and " The Relation of Art to Truth," by W. H. 
Mallock, Forum, IX. 36. 



252 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

broader differences of character. If his earlier instruction has 
included such things, he nl'ay see the purpose of the book as 
a whole, and understand a little of its structure. If he reads 
a poem, like The Vision of Sir Launfal, he may be impressed 
with the beauty of certain scenes, get the drift and significance 
of the poem as a whole, and feel some of the charm of metre 
and diction. If he reads an essay, like the simpler ones of 
Irving or Addison, he gets the thought in sentences, but 
seldom sees the whole essay in its developed idea. 

In general, he will understand and appreciate, but in limited 
degree. The work of the teacher, therefore, is to lead him to 
understand better and to enjoy more. 

In the purely intellectual side of the work there are certain 
definite things to be aimed at : — 

(i) Words are to be learned. The diction of ordinary 
life has many terms with whose exact meaning the pupil is 
The study not f armuar - T ne diction of literature being more 
of Words. artificial, more analytic, and richer, will include 
many terms either new or imperfectly known. These are 
to be learned in their relationships, and not as disjecta 
membra. The dictionary should become not only a familiar 
book, but an interesting book; there is no reason to fear a 
too frequent use of the dictionary. Interest in words can be 
cultivated by skilful discussion of their meanings and their 
suggestiveness. Clear paraphrasing of difficult passages 
should be often required. In reading Shakspere such study 
is of the first importance. Much of the failure in intelligent 
interest in this poet is due solely to the unfamiliarity of his 
diction. 1 Ruskin's well-known passages on this subject of 
knowing words should be familiar to all young readers : — 

" You must get yourself into the habit of looking intensely 
at words, and assuring yourself of their meaning, syllable by 
syllable, letter by letter. You might read all the books in the 
British Museum (if you could live long enough) and remain 



1 Schmidt's Shakespeare Lexikon should be in the possession of every 
secondary school. 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 253 

an utterly ' illiterate,' uneducated person : but if you read 
ten pages of a good book, letter by letter, — that is to say 
with real accuracy, — you are forevermore in some measure 
an educated person." 1 This is, perhaps, an extreme statement, 
but there is essential truth in it. Slipshod, careless reading 
never raises a student to the higher level of power. He may 
gain vague ideas and real emotional experiences thereby, but 
he will not get the best that literature holds for him. What 
is suggested in the language of literature is greater and more 
beautiful than what is obviously said, so that only the most 
careful, thoughtful reading will reveal the beauty or the 
strength of the passage. 

(2) Allusions must be learned. Only a few of the books 

read in the high school are so allusive as to make this a 

difficult task. 2 But even though the looking up of . 

11 . . , Allusions, 

such references involves some labour, it is one 01 

the things to be done. In the preceding chapter 3 the treat- 
ment of allusions has been discussed at some length. The 
principles there stated for the elementary school apply equally 
to the secondary school. 

(3) But the study of literature which stops with the learn- 
ing of words and allusions is entirely inadequate. These 
things are but a part of what is involved in intel- 
ligent reading. A work of literature is an art, c e * 
and therefore follows certain laws of structure. These laws 
may not be perfectly or mechanically obeyed ; but they are 
evident to the thoughtful reader. The order in which a topic 
is developed in a paragraph, the development of a theme in 
a story, the relations to each other of the parts of any sort of 
literary composition, are a part of the qualities that make it 
literature and therefore legitimate subjects for consideration. 
For the same reason the metrical structure of poetry should 



1 See his Sesame and Lilies for this and much more of the same tenor. 

2 Milton's poems and Tennyson's The Princess are examples of books 
made difficult by excessive allusiveness. 

3 See pp. 167-169. 



254 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

be considered. The scansion of poetry is an easy matter 
(though the theories as to the nature of English verse may 
differ), and well worth doing for the increase of one's enjoy- 
ment of the form. 

(4) Necessary as it is to understand the diction and appre- 
ciate the forms of literature, these are, after all, to be regarded 

only as means in the effective achievement of an 
Meaning of \ . . . . . , . , . . . , 

the Book as end, which end is the meaning and spirit of the 

whole. This is the vital thing ; the whole story, 
the whole play, the whole poem, with their significance as pres- 
entations of some thought, some mood, some phase of life. 
No appreciation of single parts or of particular effects is suffi- 
cient. We must know and feel the book as a whole. What 
does it mean? What, in a few words, would be a bare and 
prosaic statement of the author's idea ? What is his attitude 
towards his theme? What are the emotions aroused? In 
fine, what is this thing? Of course an answer to these ques- 
tions put in our own words is ridiculously inadequate compared 
with the idea as revealed in and through the book. But none 
the less such are the questions we must put to ourselves when 
we thoughtfully weigh what we read. 

In the study of any given piece of literature we may concern 
ourselves primarily with it as a revelation of the personality of 
the author, as a link in the chain of development of that type 
of literature, as an expression of the life and spirit of the time 
in which it was written, or as a work of art to be judged en- 
tirely in comparison with ideal standards. 1 

1. When we consider a piece of literature as a revelation of 
the author's personality, we must not only bring to it the 
power of analysis that makes clear the thoughts and 
Personality ideals, the views of life and feelings that it repre- 
Author. sents, but must know something of the biography 

of the author ; his other works, the conditions and influences 



1 See an interesting article by Professor Calvin Thomas on " Litera- 
ture and Personality " in Proceedings of the Modern Language Association, 
XII. 1896. 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 255 

of his environment, the characteristic qualities of contem- 
porary literature, and the literary and other formative influences 
that immediately affected his work. In Mrs. Shelley's Franken- 
stein, for example, we have a good opportunity for such study. 1 
We know the company and the circumstances in which the 
story was conceived, the literary models that were in immedi- 
ate influence over the circle of which she was a part, the phil- 
osophical ideas in which she was reared ; and we can see these 
things abundantly reflected in her development of the story. 
In George Eliot's works we can see her democratic sympathies, 
her scientific and philosophical interests, and her attitude of 
protest against the false and restricted conventions of thought. 
In Tennyson we find a respect for law working by evolutionary 
processes and a belief in the ultimate elevation of humanity. 
How different Milton was from the proverbial psalm- singing 
Puritan of satire and story lies on the surface in IS Allegro and 
// Penseroso. The dominant mental attitudes of Dickens, 
Thackeray, and Browning are familiar to all their thoughtful 
readers. 

The examples here cited at once suggest our first difficulty : 
that of discriminating between the individuality of the particu- 
lar author and the spirit of the time in which he lived. Such 
discrimination, calling for keen powers of analysis and full 
knowledge of the intellectual life of the time, is not a task 
for school boys. We must be content if they gather a sense 
of what the author was, what he thought and felt, without 
attempting the measure of his originality. 

But the acquaintance with a great author means yet more. 
Professor Dowden well summarizes it in his excellent essay on 
The Interpretation of Literature : 2 — 

"From each work of a great author we advance to his 
total work, and thence to the man himself, — to the heart 
and brain from which all this manifold world of wisdom 
and wit and passion and beauty has proceeded. Here 



1 See Mrs. Shelley's Introduction to the story. 

2 See this essay in his Transcripts and Studies, London, i< 



2$6 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

again, before we address ourselves to the interpretation 
of the author's mind, we patiently submit ourselves to a 
vast series of impressions. And in accordance with Bacon's 
maxim that a prudent interrogation is the half of knowl- 
edge, it is right to provide ourselves with a number of 
well-considered questions which we may address to our author. 
Let us cross-examine him as students of mental and moral 
science, and find replies in his written words. Are his senses 
vigorous and fine ? Does he see colour as well as form ? Does 
he delight in all that appeals to the sense of hearing, — the 
voices of Nature, and the melody and harmonies of the art of 
man? Thus Wordsworth, exquisitely organized for enjoying 
and interpreting all natural, and, if we may so say, homeless 
and primitive sounds, had little feeling for the delights of 
music. Can he enrich his poetry by gifts from the sense of 
smell, as did Keats ; or is his nose, like Wordsworth's, an idle 
promontory projecting into a desert air? Has he, like Brown- 
ing, a vigorous pleasure in all strenuous muscular movements ; 
or does he, like Shelley, live rapturously in the finest nervous 
thrills? How does he experience and interpret the feeling of 
sex, and in what parts of his entire nature does that feeling 
find its elevating connections and associations? What are his 
special intellectual powers ? Is his intellect combative or con- 
templative ? What are the laws which chiefly preside over the 
associations of his ideas? What are the emotions which he 
feels most strongly, and how do his emotions coalesce with one 
another? Wonder, terror, awe, love, grief, hope, despon- 
dency, the benevolent affections, admiration and religious senti- 
ment, the moral sentiment, the emotion of power, irascible 
emotion, ideal emotion — how do these make themselves felt 
in and through his writings? What is his feeling for the beau- 
tiful, the sublime, the ludicrous? Is he of weak or vigorous 
will ? In the conflict of motives, which class of motives with 
him is likely to predominate ? Is he framed to believe or 
framed to doubt? Is he prudent, just, temperate, or the re- 
verse of these? These and like questions are not to be crudely 
and formally proposed, but are to be used with tact ; nor 
should the critic press for hard and definite answers, but know 
how skilfully to glean its meaning from an evasion. He is a 
dull cross-examiner who will invariably follow the scheme 
which he has thought out and prepared beforehand, and who 
cannot vary his questions to surprise or beguile the truth from 
an unwilling witness. But the tact which comes from natural 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 2$? 

gift and from experience may be well supported by something 
of method, — method well hidden away from the surface and 
from sight." 

2. We may be interested in that form of comparative study 
which considers a piece of literature in its place in the devel- 
opment of the type. The De Coverley Papers fore- 
cast the emergence of the modern novel from the Development 
essay on men and manners, 1 and Goldsmith carries ° P S ' 
the development a little further in The Vicar of Wakefield, 
though still encumbered with the essayist's attitude of mind. 
Macbeth and King Lear are higher forms of art than their 
predecessors, the " tragedies of blood " of a few years earlier. 
So in the various forms of English Literature there is evident 
a continuous series of changes, sometimes in the development 
to more perfect types, sometimes in the decadence of perfected 
types. These changes are evident in both form and content. 

(i) In form, such work as that of Fielding in the eighteenth 
century and Jane Austen in the nineteenth century are excel- 
lent examples of progress towards a definite organic 
structure unknown to the early periods of English 
prose fiction. Certain metrical developments, like the blank 
verse of Shakspere and Milton and the heroic couplets of 
Dryden and Pope ; the clear and direct prose of the eighteenth 
century, and the equally clear and more flowing prose of the 
nineteenth century, are examples of another development in 
form. 

(2) More interesting to most readers is the development 

of ideas and their expression in literature. What Addison and 

Steele tell us of the thought and feeling of the 

. , and Content. 
London of Queen Anne, what Jane Austen and 

Shelley and Byron give us of the forms of thought a century later, 

and the full light thrown upon the intellectual life of England 

by later poets and novelists, are matters of surpassing interest. 2 



1 See Cross's Development of the English Novel, New York, 1900. 

2 See, for example, Vida D. Scudder's Social Ideals in English Litera- 
ture, Boston, 1900. 

17 



258 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

(3) The judgment of a piece of literature is, by general 
admission, most fascinating and most difficult. Every book 
Critical we reac ^ challenges us to a critical estimate, and 

Study. a u f US} no ma tter how unqualified we may be by 

native gifts and experience, respond to the challenge by mak- 
ing our estimate of its value. And yet, though we are thus 
constrained to pass judgment upon our literary as upon our 
other experiences, the history of contemporary criticism pre- 
sents a series of blunders perhaps more egregious and amusing 
than any other field of thought. With a few brilliant excep- 
tions, the only safe criticism is the result of the accumulated 
verdicts of several generations. Nor is the criticism of books 
seen in their due perspective of time in much better case. 
Where there is agreement that the book or the author is great, 
there is the widest difference as to what the nature of the 
greatness is. Shakspere is variously commended for his art, 
his wisdom, or his learning ; and those who find one of these 
qualities often deny or ignore the others. Such difficulties 
proceed in part from the lack of agreement in the fundamen- 
tals of aesthetics, in part from the personal bias which enters 
so largely into our appreciation of any form of art, in part 
from general ignorance of the field in which the criticism is 
made, in part from the lack of mental powers and of that 
peculiar sensitiveness which is a lesser form of the same 
qualities that make the poet. Notwithstanding the limitation 
upon our power of criticism, it is neither to be expected nor 
desired that we should cease to exercise our judgment. The 
judgment grows by exercise even of a crude sort. What is to 
be deprecated is a readiness to form dogmatic conclusions, and 
to ignore the value of wide knowledge and experience. 

As a matter of fact, in most of our thoughtful reading we are 
interested in all the foregoing questions. We seek to know 
the author better and to get his peculiar message for us, to 
place the book in its proper relation in the historical develop- 
ment in our literature, and to judge of its actual value as a 
revelation of life and a thing of beauty. Different works do, 
however, interest us in greater degrees in one or other of these 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 259 

topics : sometimes it is the historical aspect, sometimes the 
personal element, sometimes the mere beauty of the work that 
attracts us. 

The selection of the present uniform series of books known 
as " the college entrance requirements " is discussed elsewhere. 
As they form the bulk of the English curriculum in most schools, 
and as they also include all the types of literature that are 
studied, — the novel, the essay, the lyric, the romantic narrative 
poem, and the drama, — with the distinctive traits of most of the 
literary groups from Shakspere to Tennyson, it will be most 
convenient to discuss the teaching of literature through them 
as examples. 

In fiction the primary interest is in the story. To get a full 
and clear knowledge of the story is the first thing. Such 
knowledge must include a vivid imagining of the The Study of 
action, and a perception of the order and arrange- tte Wovel « 
ment of the incidents, — particularly where they are related as 
cause and effect. To decry the interest in the mere story is 
to misapprehend the value and purpose of this form of art. 
In good fiction the story is the embodiment of the author's 
view of some phase of human life, given not in abstract terms 
but as a concrete vision. Its great value lies not only in its 
powerful appeal to our interest and its effect upon our 
emotions, but also in the persistence with which it lives in our 
memory, ready to take on new and deeper meaning as we 
reinterpret it in the light of wider experience and deeper 
thought. What the later centuries with their modified points 
of view have added to the meaning of such works as Don 
Quixote and The Merchant of Venice, the individual man may 
do with the memories of stories read in his boyhood. 

The plot should be studied not only to be known as a story, 
but in its structure, as a thing of parts skilfully built to pro- 
duce a unified effect. 1 The introduction, in its function of 



1 See the volume on Narration, by W. T. Brewster, New York, .1895, 
and the bibliography there given for the study of narration. See also 



260 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

fixing the story in time and place, of presenting the characters, 
or of giving the tone of the narrative, or of all these func- 
tions, should be noted. The development of the 
plot by incident, the interweaving of principal 
and subordinate plots and their points of contact, the arrange- 
ment of the action in certain large and vivid scenes, with 
lesser incidents between, as in Ivanhoe, the climax 
of the action, and the unravelling of the plot to its 
denouement should be carefully noted. Throughout all such 
study the question of the probability of the action, 1 its truth to 
human life, and its use of ordinary or extraordinary means, will 
serve to stimulate interest and understanding. It is worth while 
to ask, for example, whether so skilful and probable a story as 
Silas Marner is not impaired by the employment of the 
hero's cataleptic trances in the two crises of his history, or 
by the use of the stone-pit for the obvious convenience of the 
author in abstracting and restoring the hero's gold at con- 
venient seasons ; or whether the probability of The Rime of the 
Ancient Mariner, as a spiritual experience, is impaired by the 
impossibility of its material events. 

Closely related to the study of plot is that of character. In 
the higher type of narrative, the interest in plot is bound up 
with the interest in character : plot is the means 
by which character is set forth and developed, the 
author's medium of portraying human life. In the study of 
fiction, therefore, we note the interaction between plot and 
character; we are interested in seeing how each affects or 
determines the other. The portrayal of character is also in- 
teresting apart from the plot. The celebrated characters of 
literature are types of human nature, throwing into high relief 
its various phases. By acquaintance with them we not only 
widen our knowledge of the world of men and women about 



Crawshaw's Interpretation of Literature, New York, 1896, and The Study 
of Fiction, by A. W. Hitchcock, Boston, 1899. 

1 See Chapters II. and III. in Butcher's Aristotle's Theory of Poetry 
and Fine Art, London, 1896, and Woodberry's Heart of Man, New York, 
1900. 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 261 

us, but become more definitely conscious of what we ourselves 
are, actually or potentially. Each of us finds in himself the 
counterpart of the simple Vicar, the ambitious Macbeth, the 
unreasonable Lear, or even the witty, boastful, and evasive 
FalstafT. 

It is not to be expected that pupils in the secondary school 
will make minute analysis of traits of character. Such a re- 
quirement usually leads them into vague attempts at classifica- 
tion and dulls their interest. But they can be led to see 
and name the salient points, to note how the character is 
made to reveal himself, and to see in the revelation some 
phase of our common human nature, either in the type as it 
stands or in the relationship held by the character to the life 
about him. 

But plot and character in their interrelations are, as has been 
said, the means by which the author presents his thoughts and 
feelings about life, that is, his interpretation of interpreta- 
life. What this large effect of the story is, may tion - 
well be considered. We must ask, What does the work mean 
as a whole ? What is the author's own dominant interest in 
the story? Where do his sympathies lie? How would he 
state his idea in simple form, if, like Hawthorne in his 
American Notes, he had made jottings of ideas to be embodied 
in stories? It is not assumed here that every story has a 
moral purpose. The author's aim may be as purely aesthetic 
as is that of the artist who paints a rose. Between Scott 
and George Eliot one feels a wide difference in ethical 
interest. But it is just as pertinent to ask ourselves the 
aim and interest in a romance by the former as in a novel by 
the latter. 

In the study of fiction as here suggested, the teacher must 
exercise a large freedom. Some books may be touched lightly, 
others in great" - detail ; 4 " the "ame book different parts will 
receive quite different of attention. Above all thir 

the work must not become formal and mechanical, but must 
keep alive the interest . movement and meaning of the 

story. As an example of the fuller treatment an anah • 



262 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

Chapter XII. of Silas Marner may be taken. 1 The pupils may 
be asked to note how the introductory sentence is transitional ; 
what motives had driven Godfrey's wife forth on her errand ; 
what her life and experience had been, and how these extenu- 
ated her wrong-doing; what part mere chance had in the 
entrance of the child ; what memories of recent and remote 
events drew Silas to the child ; what part his simple and super- 
stitious nature had in the event; what point the story has 
now reached in its development ; what skill the author shows 
in analyzing mental states, and in giving a clear picture. 

Reference has already been made to the various types of 
literature represented in the ordinary high school course. 
_ . . Within the field of fiction we have the psycholog- 
Treatment. ical novel in Silas Ma?"ner, the historical romance 
in Ivanhoe, and the novel of men and manners closely related 
to the essay in The Vicar of Wakefield. Each of these types 
naturally demands a somewhat different treatment. In the 
first, the interest is mainly in plot and its relation to the evolu- 
tion of character ; in the second it is the creation of an inter- 
esting and romantic story, wherein appear the life and ideals of 
a vanished age ; in the third, the portrayal of a group of 
characters with the simple foibles and virtues of the author, 
and their behaviour in adversity. 

It is well to have, in teaching any book, some large aim 
Silas Marner: which shall be coincident with the author's own pur- 
its Theme. pose. Such an aim George Eliot has given in Silas 
Marner. In the quotation prefixed she announces her theme : 

" A child, more than all other gifts 
That earth can offer to declining man, 
Brings hope with it and forward looking thoughts." 

This is the idea exemplified in the story, and in its skilful 
working out appear the excellent structure, genuine feeling, 
1 real insight of the bo 



1 Many of the college entrance requirements texts now have excellent 
• questions sugge- of view. 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 263 

In the beginning there must be a situation of hopelessness. 
This is brought about by depriving the hero at one blow of 
his friendship, his love, and his religion. That he may lose these 
he is made simple and helpless in the catastrophe that be- 
falls him. That he may continue estranged from his fel- 
low-men, he is placed in a new environment, where strangers 
are rare, where both his appearance and his craft seem 
strange, and where even the forms of religion are unintel- 
ligible to him. Here his estrangement is at once fixed 
by his growing love of gold, even while we see that the 
heart of the man is sound because he still has need of 
something to love. When the time draws near for his regen- 
eration, he is first deprived of his gold, and then given the 
child to love under circumstances which link it peculiarly with 
his love for his gold and with the tenderest memories of his 
own childhood. From this point on the story concerns itself 
with the gradual reunion of Silas with his fellow-men, in the 
resumption of the right and normal relations through the influ- 
ence of the child. 

The secondary plot, the story of the Cass family, is made to 
touch the main story in a natural and effective way for devel- 
oping the character of Silas : in the theft of the subordinate 
money, in the appearance of the child, and finally Parts - 
in the opportunity given to Eppie to reward her foster-father's 
love. While subordinate to the main plot, the story of the 
house of Cass has also its own meaning and purpose. The 
episodes which reveal the simple community life, though brief 
and infrequent, are worth study for their humorous sympathy, 
their skilful portrayal of character, and their representation of 
simple rustic life. 

The personality of the author as expressed in her sympathies 
and interests is easily to be seen. She touches the ignorance 
and prejudices of these rustic folk with a broad and 
kindly spirit, whether dealing with their foibles or points of 
their untutored religious beliefs ; she is deeply 
interested in the problems of right living, and in showing not 
only the relation between the characters and their environ- 



264 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

ment, but also their development under these influences; her 
method is not only to present, but to explain ; and her atti- 
tude towards the life she presents includes those of both the 
artist and the philosophical thinker. In these things she was 
of the nineteenth century, with its scientific interests and its 
social and humanitarian sympathies. 1 

The historical romance, represented in the curriculum in 
Ivanhoe and The Last of the Mohicans, has been justly re- 
The Historical garded as a type of special importance. This 
Romance. importance is due to the fact that it is one of the 
most interesting types to the juvenile mind, and to the relation- 
ship between it and the more exact subject of history. 

1. Its interest for young people lies in its strong action, 
"high speeches," and strenuous ideals, and in part in the im- 
pression it is able to create of being a " true story." Reaching, 
as it does in the best instances, the higher standards of art, it 
is therefore one of the best means of cultivating a genuine love 
of reading, and as such should not only hold a place in the 
curriculum, but should be made the definite starting-point for 
further incursions into the field of historical fiction, whether 
prose or poetry. The ballad, the battle lyric, the metrical 
romance, and the epic can be shown to be artistic presentations 
of ideas and feelings that have their ultimate roots in or have 
clustered round some definite historical experience, and there- 
fore to have a kind of obvious reality. 

2. Its relationship to history is frequently alleged as the 
ground upon which to base the teaching of the historical novel. 
It is argued (1) that it will impart many valuable historical 
ideas, (2) that it will incite to further historical study and in- 
vestigation. Counter arguments are also made to the effect 
(1) that it is utterly unreliable as history, 2 and is therefore not 



1 One of the best studies of George Eliot is by Frederic Harrison, in 
Early Victorian Literature, London and New York, 1895 » printed also in 
the Forum, vol. xx. « 

2 See Freeman's Methods of Historical Study, New York, 1886, and his 
Norman Conquest, New York, 1880, for an opinion on the historicity of 
Ivanhoe. 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 265 

only worthless but injurious, because it presents the false ideas 
so attractively, and (2) that the pupil is more likely to rest 
content with the fascinating falsehood than to go in search of 
the dry truth. Amid such conflicting opinions the truth is 
not easy to discover. It may, however, be maintained (1) 
that much of the matter in good historical novels is true history, 
though mingled with error, (2) that history is thereby rendered 
more attractive because it is interpreted and made more human, 
and (3) that pupils will sometimes be incited by the historical 
novel to a further reading of history. 

But all this discussion seems to me to miss the main point. 
The historical novel is literature, and as literature it is to be 
judged and taught. Like all other literature, its fundamental 
interest is in human experience, its fundamental purpose to 
present human experience in an attractive, coherent, convinc- 
ing manner, and to keep itself true to human nature. The 
mixture of dates in Shakspere's King Henry the Eighth x does 
invalidate the play as history, but does not impair its truth as a 
presentation of human character. The story is worked out with 
a verisimilitude of fact and a truth to human nature which are 
of a high order of art. The whole question must be carried 
back to the time-honoured distinction between historic and po- 
etic truth. 2 As Aristotle pointed out, the poet — and the 
plea includes the novelist — is not concerned so much with a 
true record of fact as with a presentation of human life that 
shall be true in that it faithfully represents human nature. It 
is the old distinction between fact and truth, between the real 
and the ideal. 

It must be granted, however, that the novelist who chooses 
a historical field thereby conditions his freedom. While he 
gains in interest by selecting what is already known to his 



1 See the list of misplaced events given in the notes of the Rolfe edition, 
New York, 1894. 

2 See Butcher's Aristotle's Theory of Poetry and Fine Art, London and 
New York, 1896; Mallock's "The Relation of Art to Truth," Forum, 
IX. 36, and Paul Leicester Ford's " The Historical Novel," Atlantic 
Monthly, December, 1897. 



266 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

readers, and in apparent truth by keeping within the range of 
known historical facts, he runs the risk of forfeiting our belief 
by distortion of facts with which we are familiar. Anachro- 
nisms are harmless to the unlearned or in unknown fields ; but 
they are disturbing when they overturn our settled and familiar 
memories ; and the novelist is expected to convey a true general 
impression of the life and spirit of the period he presents. 
Thus the necessity of historical accuracy in fiction is seen to 
be in a certain ratio to the general historical information of the 
reader. It was of less value to Shakspere than to Scott, and of 
less value to Scott than to any one of the present generation of 
historical romancers. 

If the foregoing arguments are valid, we should select for the 
curriculum the historical novels which are the best as novels, 
and treat them in the same way as other types of fictitious 
narrative. The impossibility of Cooper's Red Man as a his- 
torical concept is perhaps a blemish, but the truth of his books 
to the spirit of pioneer life is an excellence to offset many 
blemishes. With all his antiquarian interests and achieve- 
ments, 1 Scott had not the point of view of the modern 
scientific historian; but he had a spacious imagination, a 
capacious and well-filled memory, a wholesome spirit, true 
insight into human nature, and the creative powers of a 
great artist. 

A few suggestions may be permitted here as to the treatment 
of Ivanhoe. In structure it contains a few great scenes, the 
intervals between these filled with minor incidents 
Ivanhoe. i ea ding up to or growing out of the larger scenes ; 

where it is merely episodic, there is sufficient interest in the 
episodes to justify their presence. It is full of detailed repro- 
duction of a vanished age, with its customs, manners, and 
ideals. Its characters are diverse, often strongly drawn, but 
unequal in treatment, the more chivalrous types being gener- 



1 The introductions to his novels show that Scott constantly strove to 
present life either as he believed it to have been in history or as he saw 
it in his own time. 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 267 

ally inferior in vividness to the wicked or the homely. Its 
action is free and varied, its spirit romantic, its tone as whole- 
some as the forest air breathed by Robin Hood and his band, 
though it has no ethical purpose, and can hardly be said to 
have any definite theme. It is, above all things, a story told in 
a succession of interesting pictures. These considerations 
should determine its treatment. Collateral reading of other 
tales of chivalry, information upon points relating to interest- 
ing customs and ideas here presented, and pictures to help in 
realizing the ideas, will often be of value. But it is not to be 
studied minutely : nothing of Scott's is. It is to be read, 
imagined, enjoyed. Its diction and its structure are possibly 
the only things that require any study ; and these are not diffi- 
cult. The book will be of most value if the teacher can come 
to know its qualities more fully than we have outlined them, 
and bring the class to know the story well and to enter into 
its spirit. 

The Vicar of Wakefield differs widely in type from the 
books just discussed. With adults it is almost safe to say 
that enjoyment of this classic is a test of a culti- The y icar of 
vated mind, but it is by no means so sure to please Wakefield - 
boys and girls. It presupposes a mellowness of judgment and 
a fulness of experience which few young minds can of them- 
selves reach by imaginative sympathy. Its theme, similar to 
that of the Book of Job, is clear enough and interesting enough, 
but so badly developed, so full of improbabilities and cheap 
devices of plot that it wins scant respect from young readers. 
Its frequent essay-like digressions render it tedious to them ; 
and its philosophy of life is somewhat too mild and simple for 
their crude taste. And yet the book may be successfully 
taught. It is recommended that in this one instance the 
teacher begin with the biography of the author. The lives of 
Goldsmith written by Irving, William Black, 1 and Austin Dob- 
son 2 should first be well known by the teacher; then such 



1 English Men of Letters Series, London and New York. 

2 Great Writers Series, London. 



268 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

gleanings regarding Goldsmith as may be found in Boswell and 
other contemporary sources. To this let him add a fair knowl- 
edge of the contemporary literary history, a familiarity with 
the best Goldsmith criticism, and a love of this gentle-spirited 
classic, and he should be ready for his work. If he begins by 
telling the class about the author, personalia being here the 
things of prime importance and rich enough in themselves to 
occupy an entire lesson, and then explains to the class that the 
book is not to be read for its plot, but for its reflection of the 
man Goldsmith, for its quiet, mellow humour, its portrayal of 
simple domestic virtues, and its subtle shadings of character, he 
will have removed from the path of the class the principal 
stumbling-block. These things should be kept in mind 
throughout the reading of the book, and recalled and reinforced 
as they are suggested in the course of the work. Like most 
works touched with humour, it is shy of the analytic spirit, and 
yields most pleasure when it is read aloud. 

There are certain facts of literary history connected with 
the book which should be noticed. It stands between the 
completely developed novel and the essay, which is one of the 
literary forms out of which the modern novel emerged. It be- 
longs also in the long series of pastoral literature beginning with 
Theocritus and extending its influence to our own day ; and like 
all pastoral literature celebrates the virtues that are supposed 
to flourish in a life of simplicity. It stands about midway in 
the romantic revival which began in the first half and culmi- 
nated in the end of the eighteenth century, and reflects many 
of the features common to that revival : tenderness, kindly 
humour, and sympathy with lowly life. 

Midway between the novel and the essay stand The De 
Coverley Papers, easily the most famous examples of peri- 
odical literature in the English language. Without 
De Coverley the help of a good teacher, they may seem dull to 
the pupils ; with such help they are very interest- 
ing. They furnish such a transcript of the life of the period 
that historians draw freely upon them. Reinforced by other 
numbers of The Spectator and by references to the social 






ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 269 

life of the period in other sources, 1 the book becomes an 
attractive medium of entrance to this interesting period of 
history ; its political interests, its coffee-houses, theatres and 
pleasure gardens, its rough sports, its exaggerated fashions, its 
frank interest in the things of this world, move vividly before 
us. No less interesting are these remarkable papers for their 
place in the development of literary types. In the midst of a 
large body of satirical and didactic literature they are conspic- 
uous, not only for their impersonality and urbanity of tone, but 
for their rare success in winning large popularity among the 
very readers whose follies and vices they hold up to pleasant 
ridicule. As the beginning of the modern novel, we note the 
interest in contemporary life, the rudimentary plot in the club 
as a centre for the characters, the presentation of types of 
character, and especially the fine poetic idealization of the 
good Sir Roger. 2 It is not a book for minute study, but rather 
for that easier kind of reading in which one notes the graces of 
style and character, while he sees another type of civilization 
than his own paraded before him as an interesting spectacle. 

The essays in the college entrance requirement list are of 
the biographical and critical type now rare in our contem- 
porary literature of criticism, but of considerable . 
interest historically. The two of Macaulay 3 deal 
with the life and work of men who are otherwise represented 
in the same list. Obviously there is good reason for reading 



1 See especially John Ashton's Social Life in the Reign of Queen Anne, 
W. C. Sydney's England and the English in the Eighteenth Century, 
Traill's Social England, IV., Frances Bumey's Evelina, and Green's 
History of the English People. 

2 See Cross, The Development of the English Novel, New York, 1900, 
and Walter Raleigh's The English Novel, New York, 1895. 

3 The essays on Milton and Addison. The essay on Johnson has re- 
cently been substituted for the former. The wisdom of this substitution 
I am inclined to doubt. The historical interest, the lifelike pictures of 
the Puritans and the Cavaliers, and the clear argument in the former are 
not equalled bv anything in the latter. The main ground of objection to 
the essay on Milton, its false theory of poetry, can easily be removed by 
any teacher who knows his subject well enough to make an appeal to 
the facts. 



2/0 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

them not too remotely from the works they criticise. What 

Macaulay thinks of the work and character of these two men 

will be our principal interest. His impressions are to be 

clearly understood and compared with those already formed 

by the class, and, it may be, with critical judgments found 

elsewhere. His estimate of the man as apart from his work 

and as expressed in his work is to be clearly grasped. In 

fact, in these, as in all the books, understanding the content is 

the first and most important thing. 

But besides the content, the form and method are to be 

somewhat carefully studied. Each essay is built upon a clear 

plan, easily divisible into large sections, and these 
Macaulay. . . 

sections again into smaller topics. The transi- 
tions between them are clear and natural. The minor units, 
paragraph and sentence, are also to be considered. The 
topics or topic-sentences of paragraphs should be found ; 
the method of clear and orderly development, usually from 
the general to the particular, from the abstract to the concrete, 
by which Macaulay makes his paragraphs not merely units but 
pictures, should be noted. His frequent use of the antithesis, 
his terseness of sentence structure, and other obvious qualities 
of his style should be seen. 

But the study of style has its dangers in the secondary 
school. It is not of much interest to boys and girls, and 

must be dealt with not only in moderation but, 
Style. - 

above all, in that clear and rational method of 

study which avoids meaningless generalizations and cites 
definite instances within the comprehension of the class. If 
we bear in mind that " English is one subject," we shall want 
to make prominent always the value of this or that point of 
style in rendering expression effective. In the present dis- 
position to rehabilitate Macaulay's it is again safe to reiterate 
that he is one of the very best authors from whom to learn 
to write. His clearness, his lack of subtlety, his comparative 
uniformity of method are, pedagogically speaking, good ; and 
even his faults are of that obvious kind which cannot mislead 
the master or do injury to the apprentice. 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 271 

What has been said above about Macaulay's essays applies 
in part to the study of Carlyle's Essay on Burns. Here, too, 
the content is the main thing, and familiarity with CM]y| ^ 
some of the work of the poet criticised is essential. 
Although this essay does not afford such valuable opportunities 
for detailed study, the study of the structure of the whole 
essay and of the paragraphs will naturally be made. 

Although belonging to oratory rather than to the essay, 
Burke's Speech on Conciliation will, we believe, be best studied 
along the lines indicated above. The student will Burke 
need to know the history involved, and to note 
the skilful way in which Burke marshals facts and arguments, 
anticipates and answers objections, and reaches the feelings 
by appealing to the convictions of his audience. The other 
essays form good examples through which to make clear the 
principles of exposition ; this serves to illustrate both exposi- 
tion and argument. 

In general, the essay is not an attractive form of literature 
to young readers. But a plan of study which makes it yield 
ideas can secure respect for it and go far towards making it 
agreeable. In fact, though the essay has not the attractiveness 
of a poem or a story to imaginative children, it does have an 
obvious intellectual weight and definiteness which put it along- 
side the serious work in other subjects of the curriculum. 

To many good teachers of English the teaching of poetry is 
a peculiar pleasure, to others a peculiar difficulty. As poetry 
is more condensed than prose, more allusive and The Teaching 
indirect, more imaginative and more dependent ° Poetr y- 
upon form, it is harder to read, and therefore affords more 
opportunities to the teacher ; as it is more subtle, more in- 
tangible, more in the realm of emotion and less in the realm 
of exact intellectual activities, it is less subject to treatment 
by any prescribed method. Of course we know that it is to 
be understood and appreciated. But the mere understanding 
of it is so bound up with emotional experiences, that explain- 
ing it is often as impossible for the teacher as for the pupil : 
the explanation of poetry is often worse than the explanation 



272 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

of humour. Much of the pleasure in reading poetry comes in 

the perception of the exquisite blending of musical speech, 

beauty of picture and emotional tone. But neither this nor 

any other summary of the qualities of poetry is adequate. 

The wide range of effects attained can be known only by 

familiarity with good poetry and good interpretative criticism. 

A survey of the many good editions now in print of the college 

entrance books, with their notes and questions for students 

and teachers, will of itself convince that there is much that is 

both definite and stimulating to be done in the study of 

poetry. In spite of the difficulties of the work, there are 

many teachers as successful in the interpretative study of 

poetry in the classroom as are the critics in their essays. 

The task of the teacher is, indeed, not essentially different 

from that of the writer of interpretative studies, except in the 

methods of approach. 

Narrative poems demand the same treatment as to theme, 

structure, character, and general tone as do prose narratives. 

What they have beyond these in finish of expres- 
TheRimeof 
the Ancient sion and imaginative glamour may also be felt and 

pointed out. Few poems present all these qualities 
in so high degree as The Rime of the Ancient Mariner. Its 
theme is clear and definite, its structure orderly and compact, 
its finish of expression almost faultless, and the imaginative 
glamour almost unique. There are so many things to be noted 
in studying it that there is danger of giving it too much 
rather than too little time. Some of the most obvious things 
may here be mentioned. Its style is like the ballads, to 
which form it is akin ; swift in movement, terse in expression, 
giving few but suggestive details, so that it requires careful 
reading and an alert imagination. Its simplicity of language, 
its richness in rhyme effects, its perfection of rhythm, and its 
striking use of repetitions are to be noted. From the begin- 
ning the presence of the supernatural in its theme is indicated 
in the manner of the Mariner. It begins and ends with the 
wedding feast and the unwilling auditor as an every- day back- 
ground, keeps constantly before us the idea of the Mariner's 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 273 

crime in the violation of the higher law of kindliness, 1 and 
leads us on into the story as worked out in the hero's con- 
science not only by his sufferings but by all the supernatural 
machinery of the poem. Its climax or turning-point, where 
the Mariner's hardness of heart is melted and he can love any 
living creature, is expressed again in the poet's own interpreta- 
tion of his tale, — 

" He prayeth best who loveth best 
All things, both great and small." 

There are three things in the poem which frequently interfere 
with the enjoyment of it by young readers : its condensed 
style, its grisly horrors, and its impossible setting. The first 
should be no great obstacle, if there be required a careful 
reading, assisted by wise and skilful suggestions from the 
teacher. The second is likely to loom up large : it sometimes 
seems that the poet has revelled in mere horrors ; but the 
teacher can show their place in working out the Mariner's 
change of heart, and their fitness in a tale of the untravelled 
waste of sea, around which superstitious horrors have always 
gathered ; and he can dwell upon the many passages of pure 
beauty until these latter overcome the others in the pupil's 
mind. To an imaginative child the third point offers no more 
difficulty than the usual machinery of fairyland. But the more 
prosaic type pupil may demand some reason for all this super- 
natural machinery. He must be brought to see that literature 
is concerned primarily, not with the natural facts of external 
nature, but with the experiences of the human soul ; that its 
claim to wide liberty in dealing with the material world has 
been long conceded ; and that in the present instance the 
subversion of the laws of the external world not only helps to 
create the imaginative glamour which is one of the charms of 
the poem, but, by keeping in close and constant parallel with 
the mental experiences of the Mariner, serves also to impress 
upon us the emotions that he felt, — is, in brief, an artistic 



1 See, for example, how each of the several parts closes with a 
reference to the albatross. 

18 



274 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

method of making those experiences concrete and vivid. The 
first appeal in literature is usually to the imagination and the 
emotions. But if the way to these needs to be prepared by 
an appeal to the reason, there can surely be no objection to 
such an approach. 

Among the difficult books to teach is Tennyson's The Prin- 
cess. Its theme not only lies without the usual range of 

interests of secondary pupils, but often seems to 
The Princess. . 

them a mere making of words over nothing. The 

story itself is so overlaid with ornament and allusion that it is 
not easy to follow ; and the mixture of ancient and modern, 
of serious and burlesque, taxes their patience. On the other 
hand, the poem is so permeated with the thought and feeling 
of the nineteenth century that it can be brought within the 
comprehension and approval of most pupils. First, the story 
should be read and known clearly. Then its theme, or quest, 
and the author's answer to the problem can be considered. 
After this the art of the poem should be studied. The medley 
element, consisting not merely in the composite manner of 
narration, but also in its mixture of ancient and modern, of 
serious and absurd, and in its union of different types of poetry, 
lyric, romantic, epic, and pastoral, 1 can be shown to be an 
appropriate form of art in which to present the half-serious, 
half-absurd problem of the poem. The function of the songs 
sung by the women in the interludes, and presenting the 
ideals of love of men and women and their love for child- 
hood, can be pointed out, and their lyric beauty be felt and 
remembered. The fitness of the characters, various types 
clearly drawn, for working out the theme, can be shown. A 
forecast of the form, the spirit, and the material is seen in 
the prologue. The humour, varying from keen satire to the 
most delicate and good-humoured banter, should be noted ; 
and the prejudice against the poem which girls are prone to 
feel on this account be removed by calling their attention to 



1 See the song, " Come down, O maid, from yonder mountain 
height." 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 275 

the fact that neither sex escapes the banter, and that the cause 
of women is really treated with chivalrous consideration. The 
poem is rich in allusions and memories of other literature ; so 
rich, indeed, that only a part of its wealth can be appreciated 
by young readers. It is rich also in pictures, " the purple 
patches " in which form, colour, and sound unite in composite 
effects of a high order. 1 While it is conceded that the poem 
is difficult to teach, it can be maintained not only that the 
poem can be and often is well taught, but that few things in 
the curriculum have as great cultural value as this rich, high- 
wrought, beautiful classic. 

The minor poems of Milton which appear in the " college 
entrance list " are L Allegro, II Penseroso, Lycidas, and Comus. 2 
The first two are simple in theme, and of obvious m^o^s 
unity in purpose and effect. It can be shown how M 11101 " Poems. 
the mood in each is presented simply by the selection of appro- 
priate details ; 3 how the two poems are parallel in structure 
while opposite in effect ; and how each of them reflects Milton 
the lover of books, art, and nature rather than Milton the 
Puritan. The beauty of individual passages will hardly need 
to be pointed out. But the allusions and the archaic diction 
will demand some serious study : how much, the teacher must 
judge for each class, that he may strike the right mean be- 
tween too little and too much. 

Lycidas is a difficult poem. Its unity is by no means 
apparent, and has often been doubted in quarters of high 
authority ; unity of tone it certainly has not. Its 
diction and machinery, literary and conventional 
in the highest degree, are the descendants of a long line of 
pastoral poetry, very little of which is known to the secondary 
pupil. It is as condensed 4 as it is possible for good English 
to be, and neither its theme nor its spirit is near to modern 



1 See especially the closing lines in Parts II. and III. 

2 It is to be regretted that some of Milton's great sonnets have not 
been included. 

3 See Newman's Aristotle's Poetics, New York, 1894. 

4 See Ruskin's analysis, cited above, p. 252. 



2?6 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

readers. On the other hand, its beauty of verse and picture 
catch the imagination and leave a sense of dignity rarely sur- 
passed; no pupil of sensibility can regard this poem with 
contempt. To be understood and enjoyed it must be studied ; 
its pastoral machinery must be translated, mentally at least, 
into ordinary and modern forms of thought, until the words 
of the poem come to convey at once and directly to the reader 
the ideas that Milton had. If it is not enjoyed then, the 
blame rests in the same places as does the responsibility for 
the pupil's mental endowments and his previous training. 

Comus is equally difficult : its high and impassioned oratory 
and imagery are condensed and philosophical ; of character 
and action it has little or none ; its theme arouses 
no special interest. Its dignity and sonorousness 
of diction, and a certain awesomeness in its general tone, the 
pupil can feel. If it is read mainly for these qualities, and as 
a monument of a vanished form of art standing somewhere 
between the drama and the opera, it is more likely to be 
appreciated than if read for the story or for the human 
interest. Like the other minor poems of Milton here dis- 
cussed, it should certainly leave behind it a respect for its 
beauty and intellectual weight, and convince the pupil that the 
highest pleasures in literature are not to be had without the 
price of labor. 

A drama is more difficult to read than a story. Action, 
description, and motive are usually given directly in narrative 
writing ; in the drama they are given indirectly or 
left to the reader's inference. The form, broken 
into scenes and acts, is harder to imagine as a unified whole 
than the more continuous form of narrative. In general, the 
teacher will have to see to it that the pupil understands 
the characters in their relation to the action, and the separate 
scenes in their relation to the whole play. 

For illustration of these and other things to be consid- 
ered in the drama, the following topics are chosen from 
Macbeth : — 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 277 

I . The source of the story, its original form, and its modifi- 
cation in Shakspere's hands. 

m , . . . . A . . , Macbeth. 

2. The opening scenes, giving in their natural 

environment and in the introduction of the Witches a sort 
of keynote to the play. 

3. The position of Macbeth, the promises of the Witches, 
the fulfilment of a part of these promises, and the stirring of 
more ambitious hopes in him. 

4. The evidences for and against the belief that Macbeth 
had conceived the murder before he met the Witches; the 
nature and degree of his responsibility. 

5. Lady Macbeth's part in inciting him to the crime; her 
methods and her motives. 

6. The descriptive elements attending the crime : means 
of arousing terror, such as the sounds that Macbeth hears in 
the murder scene and the knocking at the gate. 

7. Macbeth's character : his fears of the uncertain or 
unknown, his excitable imagination, the nature of his scruples, 
his motives ; how these are employed later in leading him to 
his destruction. 

8. The part of Banquo in the first and second acts. 

9. The change in Macbeth's motives, terror added to 
ambition ; the recklessness with which he plunges into crime 
on his own initiative. 

10. The change in Lady Macbeth. 

II. The banquet scene: how prepared for in preceding 
scenes, how made effective, its part in determining the future 
of Macbeth. 

12. Macduff as the leader of the avenging force. Where 
he first appears in this light, and his actions in succeeding 
scenes. 

13. Lady Macbeth's diminishing prominence in the play: 
her break-down ; the sleep-walking scene, how made effective. 

14. The irony or Nemesis in the play : how it is shown that 
Macbeth's hopes are disappointed, his deeds react upon him- 
self, and his troubles spring ultimately from what was in 
himself at the beginning of the play. 



278 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

15. Macbeth as a tragic hero: how far he satisfies the 
accepted canons of dramatic criticism. 

These few topics out of many that might be suggested will 
serve to illustrate the richness of the drama as a subject of 
study. Free discussion, taking in all parts of the play, should 
be encouraged. It is most essential that pupils should read 
carefully, know clearly the meanings of the sentences, and 
learn to bring to the interpretation of one part of the play 
what they have found in another. In the drama as in other 
forms of poetry, the beauties of individual passages should 
be noted. Some of the speeches of Macbeth are proverbial 
for their high order of imaginative beauty. 

In all his teaching of literature the problem of the teacher 
begins, not with questions of method, but with matters of fact 
Questions of an d interpretation. If he knows his literature 
Method. we ^ cr it;i ca iiy an d i n its historical relations, and if 

he has an alert and sympathetic type of mind, he has the best 
equipment for teaching it. But there are, nevertheless, certain 
questions of method to be considered, — questions which rest 
in part upon the literature chosen and in part upon the class to 
be taught. The principal point of doubt seems to be with re- 
gard to the amount of discussion and analytic work. Theories 
vary from a belief in merely reading the literature aloud in the 
classroom * to the advocacy of minute and searching questions 
upon every detail of the work. 2 In support of the first point 
of view it is often argued that literature appeals through the ear 
to the emotions, and that any intellectual treatment, analytic or 
otherwise, kills the spirit of it. The advocates of the second 
method seem to assume that every piece of good literature is 
a perfect work, a mosaic in which every word and idea have a 
definite and inevitable function which analysis will reveal. 

From both these extreme views I dissent. I believe that in 
the mere reading much of the best of a work is not appre- 



1 See Corson, The Aims of Literary Study. 

2 See, for example, Sherman's Analytics of Literature, Boston, 1892. 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 279 

hended ; and I repose my belief not only on experience, but 
upon the endorsement of many wise men, from Bacon down to 
the present time. I dissent also from the theory that the intel- 
lectual activities necessarily kill emotion and destroy aesthetic 
pleasure. One needs only note the enthusiasm with which lovers 
of music and painting analyze effects and the means of pro- 
ducing them to see the inherent unsoundness of this general- 
ization. The poets, too, have often been the best critics, 
dwelling with interest upon the details of their own and others' 
work. It must not be forgotten that a large part of aesthetic 
pleasure proceeds from the activity of a trained mind : the 
perception of symmetry and unity, of the nice adjustment of 
means to ends, and of the fine sense of fitness between the 
parts of a work, is one of the highest rewards of the study of 
literature. It is a significant fact that the sentimentalists in 
the world of letters are usually formless and inchoate in their 
expression ; and it is a sentimental or an indolent mind that 
will not deal with literature on any other footing than an emo- 
tional one. It is true, of course, that there are some things 
that defy analysis, and other things that need none ; there are 
lyrics, for example, whose message goes straight to the heart 
and whose beauty eludes study. But these are not typical of 
literature in general ; most of it is best enjoyed when it satis- 
fies not only the feelings but also the reason. Few living 
writers have a more unquestioned rank in scholarship and taste 
than Dr. Furness, the Shaksperian scholar. His opinion on 
this point is characteristic and interesting : * — 

" We read our Shakespeare in varying moods. Hours there 
are, and they come to all of us, when we want no voice, charm 
it never so wisely, to break in upon Shakespeare's own words. 
If there be obscurity, we rather like it ; if the meaning be 
veiled, we prefer it veiled. Let the words flow on in their own 
sweet cadence, lulling our senses, charming our ears, and let 
all sharp quillets cease. When Amiens' gentle voice sings of 



1 Introduction to As You Like It, edited by Dr. Horace Howard 
Furness, Philadelphia, 1892. 



28o ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

the winter wind that ' its tooth is not so keen because it is not 
seen, ' who of us ever dreams, until wearisome commentators 
gather mumbling around, that there is in the line the faintest 
flaw in ' logical sequence ' ? But this idle, receptive mood 
does not last forever. The time comes when we would fain 
catch every ray of light flashing from these immortal plays, 
and pluck the heart out of every mystery there ; and, then, we 
listen respectfully and gratefully to every suggestion, every 
passing thought, which obscure passages have stirred and 
awakened in minds far finer than our own. Then it is that we 
welcome every aid which notes can supply." 

What is here said of commentaries on Shakspere applies 
to the careful study of other classics. There is no essential 
conflict between study and enjoyment except to lazy minds, no 
essential obstacle to study except in dull minds. And both the 
dull and the lazy must remain without the gates of the literary 
garden of the Hesperides. It cannot be too often insisted 
that the " soft education" is not that which yields most profit, 
or, indeed, the truest pleasure to the student. Teachers of 
literature and those who write about the teaching of literature 
have too often assumed that this is the one field in which 
young students cannot be expected to unite work and pleas- 
ure ; and the interesting result is often that it becomes the one 
field of work which they do not respect. It is held that the 
proof of this is that an examination cannot be given in litera- 
ture. But a good teacher has many ways of finding out the 
pupils' comprehension and appreciation of what they have 
read. 

On the other hand, there are degrees and kinds of analytic 
treatment that do kill. When analysis is pushed to the point 
of finding fifty questions to ask on one brief scene of a play, 
we grow weary, and are ready to doubt the relevancy of the 
work. Analytic work may err in three ways : (i) It may go 
into such detail as to be tedious ; (2) it may assume a degree 
of artistry that the literature does not possess ; (3) it may, and 
often does, lead to untenable conclusions regarding the mean- 
ing and effect of the piece of literature under study, forcing 
into it ideas which exist only in the mind of the analyst. 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 28 1 

What to discuss and where to stop the teacher must decide : 
he needs not only a knowledge of his class, but sound scholar- 
ship, good taste, and good sense, to save him from mistakes. 
One general principle seems to me to cover all such study : 
the analysis that reveals to the pupil new meanings within 
his power of comprehension, and new beauties within his 
power of appreciation, while keeping true to the spirit and 
tenor of the literature as it is known to scholars, — such 
analysis is not only safe, but of the very essence of good 
teaching. 

In such questioning of the meaning and spirit of the litera- 
ture as is here recommended, one naturally looks — though 
not with slavish dependence — to the critics, critical 
Most teachers of literature are under large obliga- Essays * 
tions to them. It is, I think, worth while to introduce pupils 
to such sources of enlightenment before they reach the college, 
— not to many such works, not to the inferior ones, but to 
a few of the best criticisms upon books which the pupils 
are reading or have read. There is nothing formidable 
about these writings, nor anything essentially different in 
their approach to literature from that which is made by 
the good teacher; they, too, are teachers who help us to 
see more meaning and more beauty in what we read. In 
general, however, they should be read after the classic itself 
is read. 

Literary biography is uninteresting to young people, and the 
reasons therefor have already been stated. 1 Exceptions to 
this are generally due either to the special skill of literary 
the teacher or to unusual and, we may say, facti- Bl °g r,a B UeB » 
tious elements in the author's life and character. The even 
exterior and the quiet inward activity of the man of genius do 
not strike the imagination of the boy. In such instances the 
part that is of most significance, the relation between the 
man's life and his work, can seldom be grasped except by a 
mature and cultivated mind. The main facts of the lives of 

1 See p. 179. 



282 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

our principal authors should be learned in the high school, not 
so much for immediate as for future use. Every man of even 
moderate education is expected to be able to place Shakspere 
and Dryden and Wordsworth. And yet, if we were fearlessly 
honest, might we not be brought to admit that our sensi- 
tiveness on such points is a sign not of the value of the 
knowledge so much as of a certain standard of mental 
"respectability"? 

With stronger reasons we may urge the importance of the 
study in the high school of the general history of English liter- 

The History ature on ^ otn s ^ es °^ t ^ ie Atlant i c - It is not an 
Literature attractive subject to the school boy, let us frankly 
admit. But in its general outlines, its larger move- 
ments, it presents a development of thought and feeling more 
or less evidently connected with the history of the people, and 
constituting an interesting and valuable chapter in the history 
of human thought. Such an outline should be more than a 
mere skeleton. It should be based upon a well-written text- 
book, and should be accompanied with enough incursions into 
the principal authors to get some sense of what they are like. 
If such a course succeeds in making the pupil feel a little 
more at home in the great body of our literature, and leaves 
in him the feeling that there are good things to be read at his 
later leisure all along the line between Chaucer and Tennyson, 
it will have more than justified itself. 

Such a course is probably best given after the reading of a 
number of the Classics from various periods. After the class 
has read some of Shakspere, Milton, Addison, Goldsmith, Cole- 
ridge, Wordsworth, Scott, and Tennyson, has learned about 
their contemporaries and the characteristics of contemporary 
literature, a general survey of the three centuries would serve 
to fix in his mind the succession of great men and great liter- 
ary movements, not as a series of isolated phenomena, but as a 
continuous development and an expression of the thoughts and 
feelings of the English people. 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 283 

Part III. — College Entrance Kequirements in English. 
BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Report of the Committee of Ten on Secondary School Studies. 

National Educational Association. 1894. Pp. 93-95. 
A Summary of the Proceedings of the Meetings of the Conference on 

Uniform Entrance Requirements in English. 1894-1899. See also 

the Reports of the Associations of Colleges and Preparatory Schools 

of the Middle States and Maryland. 
It. Jones. College Entrance English. University of the State of New 

York. Examination Bulletin, June, 1897. 
Report of Committee on College Entrance Requirements. National 

Educational Association. July, 1899. Pp. 12-19. 
Reports of the Committee on Composition and Rhetoric to the Board of 

Overseers of Harvard College. 1892; April, 1895; June, 1897. For 

special bibliography of the discussion aroused by these reports, see 
B. A. Hinsdale, Teaching the Language- Arts, p. ix, and P. N. Scott, 

Contributions to Rhetorical Theory, IV., References on the Teaching 

of Rhetoric and Composition. 
English in the Secondary Schools. A Plan for Work in English 

adapted to the Programmes of the Committee of Ten. Harvard 

University. 1897. 
Twenty Years of School and College English. Harvard University. 

1896. 
H. A. Beers. Entrance Requirements in English at Yale. Educa- 
tional Review, III. 427. 
E. L. Godkin. The Illiteracy of American Boys. Educational 

Review, XIII. 1. 

Suggestions for Teachers and Students, in the editions of books pre- 
scribed for study contained in Longmans' English Classics, and especially 
P. B. Gummere, Merchant of Venice, pp. xlii-xlviii. 

The question now arises, In what particulars, if any, should 
the course in English vary from the general form described 
when pupils intend to continue their liberal educa- The Present 
tion beyond the high school ? To answer this statlls * 
question properly it is necessary, first, to understand the present 
requirements in English for admission to colleges in the United 
States. Reference has already been made to the growth of 
entrance requirements in English, and to the part which 
they have played in secondary instruction in English. Up to 



284 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

about 1875 there were few or no colleges that attempted 
to test candidates in this subject. By 1885 an entrance 
examination was already firmly established at Harvard and 
at several other institutions, and by 1890 the practice was 
widespread. 1 

At first these examinations were almost invariably conducted 
with a view to testing grammatical and rhetorical correctness of 
expression, but about 1890 it came to be more generally desired 
that they should also test to some extent a candidate's acquaint- 
ance with English literature. In the last decade of the century 
three special causes led to a widely prevalent feeling that the 
whole question of entrance examinations in English should be 
dealt with from a broader and more scientific point of view. 
First, the admirable Report of the Committee of Ten (1894) 
formulated, with marked success, the whole secondary work in 
English, and attempted to outline the essential elements of a 
sound entrance examination in that subject. Second, the 
Reports of the Committee on Composition and Rhetoric to the 
Board of Overseers of Harvard College (189 2-189 7) showed 
plainly that Harvard at least was apparently asking of its candi- 
dates a greater rhetorical accuracy than could ordinarily be 
obtained. 2 Third, the preparatory schools were completely 



1 See W. C. Collar, "Action of the Colleges upon the Schools," 
Educational Review, December, 1891. 

2 The Harvard Reports . were unsatisfactory in several respects. 
First, the committee appointed consisted not of experts, but merely of 
prominent citizens with a general interest in education. Second, the 
methods of procedure were unscientific, and the results, though 
suggestive, far from definitive. Third, the intent of the reports seemed 
to throw the burden of blame upon the preparatory schools, though, 
as the college had been admitting in large numbers boys whose training 
was thus shown to be grossly defective, it would logically appear that 
the fault, as well as the remedy, lay largely with the college^authorities. 
The reports were useful, however, in stimulating the schools to renewed 
efforts in raising the college standard and in bringing about a more 
general discussion of the question. The most interesting point involved, 
in our opinion, was the alleged illiteracy of American youth as compared 
with those of other nations and with American youth of a generation or 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 285 

bewildered by the diverse requirements of the different colleges, 
some of which demanded rhetorical correctness in expression 
and others an acquaintance with English literature, and all in 
different degrees and on the basis of somewhat different sets 
of prescribed books. At this juncture the Association of 
Colleges and Preparatory Schools of the Middle States and 
Maryland appointed a committee of teachers of English in 
various schools and colleges, to bring about if possible a uni- 
formity of requirements among the colleges in its district. 
This committee wisely suggested to other similar associations 
the appointment of similar committees, and met in conference 
with them. The result was a general agreement on certain 
definite and uniform regulations for entrance examinations in 
English, which were subsequently recommended by the asso- 
ciations and adopted by almost all the colleges in the United 
States. 

The uniform requirements recommended in 1894 by the 
Conference, and now in general use throughout the United 
States, consist of an examination in composition 
and an examination in literature. The first is Requirements 
based on a list of about ten books, prescribed for onsis * 
" reading ; " the second, on a list of four or five books, prescribed 
for "study." The first examination, that in composition, may 
be taken at the end of the third high school year ; the second is 
usually taken at the end of the final year. The Conference has 
also recommended (a) "that in connection with the reading 
and study of the required books parallel or subsidiary reading 
be encouraged ; " (b) " that the essentials of English grammar, 
even if there is no examination in that subject, be not neglected 
in preparatory study ; " (/) that, in preparation for the examina- 
tion in composition, "it is important that the candidate shall 
have been instructed in the fundamental principles of rhetoric ; " 



two ago. The question of illiteracy is the real kernel of the whole 
matter. It is apparently capable of demonstration, one way or the 
other, and should be made the subject of systematic research by compe- 
tent investigators. 



286 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

and id) that, in connection with the examination on literature, 
" the candidate may be required to answer questions involving 
the essentials of English grammar, and questions on the leading 
facts in the periods of English literary history to which the 
prescribed works belong." In brief, then, the requirements 
prescribe entrance examinations in composition and literature, 
and recommend the reading and study of other English classics, 
and instruction in grammar, composition, and in parts of the 
history of English literature. 

The Conference did not intend, however, to limit the course 
of study in secondary schools to the mere preparation of candi- 
dates on a list of specified books, as is shown by the following 
supplementary resolutions, which were adopted in 1897 : — 

1. That English be studied throughout the primary and 
secondary school courses, and, when possible, for at least three 
periods a week during the four years of the high school course. 

2. That the prescribed books be regarded as a basis for such 
wider courses of English study as the schools may arrange for 
themselves. 

3. That, where careful instruction in idiomatic English trans- 
lation is not given, supplementary work to secure an equivalent 
training in diction and in sentence-structure be offered through- 
out the high school course. 

4. That a certain amount of outside reading, chiefly of 
poetry, fiction, biography, and history, be encouraged through- 
out the entire school course. 

5. That definite instruction be given in the choice of words, 
in the structure of sentences and of paragraphs, and in the simple 
forms of narration, description, exposition, and argument. 
Such instruction should begin early in the high school course. 

6. That systematic training in speaking and writing English 
be given throughout the entire school course. That, in the 
high school, subjects for compositions be taken partly from the 
prescribed books and partly from the student's own thought 
and experience. 

7. That each of the books prescribed for study be taught 
with reference to 

(a) The language, including the meaning of words and 
sentences, the important qualities of style, and the important 
allusions; 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 287 

(J?) The plan of the work, /. e., its structure and method ; 

(c) The place of the work in literary history, the circum- 
stances of its production, and the life of its author ; 

(d) That all details be studied, not as ends in themselves, but 
as means to a comprehension of the whole. 

The real accomplishment of the Conference was the securing 

of outward uniformity. As to the substance of the requirement, 

it did little more than to combine the method for „ . _^ 

Objections to 

which Harvard had long stood, — an examination the Require- 

meats, 
in composition, — with the new method which Yale 

favoured, — an examination on literature. Objections of many 

kinds have been brought up against the new requirements. 

The strongest and most pertinent are the following : — 

(1) As the Conference was from the circumstances of its 
origin rather Eastern than national, its natural tendency was to 
base its requirements on the practice of the large Eastern 
colleges, which do not attempt to supervise or inspect the 
work of their candidates throughout the whole secondary course, 
but prefer to know nothing about them except what is revealed 
by written examinations, set by the college itself, usually at the 
end of the candidate's course of preparation. The require- 
ments were, therefore, such as pertained not specifically to all 
the secondary course in English, but only to that comparatively 
small part of it that could readily be used as a basis for a brief 
preliminary or final examination. The large majority of 
American colleges, who virtually hold no entrance examinations, 
and who aim to control to a greater or less extent the whole 
course in English pursued by their candidates, could raise the 
just objection that too little attention had been paid to their 
special needs. 

(2) A second objection concerns the fact that only a few 
books are prescribed for reading and study, and these rigidly, 
without possibility of substitution. Here, again, it was the ex- 
amination policy that guided the Conference. It would be 
obviously impracticable or inconvenient to examine candidates 
on books from a larger list, within the time conventionally given 



288 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

to such tests, or to allow a wide option. Following its premises, 
therefore, the Conference chose a certain number of definite 
books, on which the candidate must present himself for ex- 
amination. It thereby went counter to the preferences of many 
schools, who would have wished to train students on Coriolanus, 
for example, rather than on Macbeth, and of many colleges 
who would have wished, for various reasons, to indicate other 
masterpieces as a basis for reading and study. 

(3) A third objection, raised as soon as the uniform argu- 
ments were put into operation, was that, though outwardly the 
requirements were practically everywhere the same, the colleges, 
as a matter of fact, were inclined to interpret them differently, 
and to relapse into their former diversity of practice. 1 

These objections to the policy adopted by the Conference 
seem to us, on the whole, just. It would have been better for 
The Policy tne cause of good instruction in English through- 
Weighed. out t k e coun i T y j jf the Conference, instead of 

formulating a set of requirements for use in one or two very 
short examinations, could have marked out an approved course 
in English, which, if necessary, could lead up to some such 
examination as the Conference had in mind. But it must be 
remembered that the Conference had no power to prescribe 
such a course of study ; that it is highly doubtful whether any 
considerable number of colleges would have been willing to 
agree in recommending any such course of study ; and, finally, 
that it is not quite possible to conceive of so large a body of 
men, with diverse views and training, as composed the Con- 
ference, themselves agreeing on any such course of study. The 
time was not yet ripe for an attempt of that sort, highly desir- 
able though it is, and it is not likely to be ripe until there has 
been a much more general and continued discussion of fun- 
damental questions, and until the results of many experiments 
now being made can be more clearly estimated. 



1 See Dr. Richard Jones's interesting pamphlet, which, however, 
greatly exaggerates the diversity of practice. 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 289 

It is to be hoped that the time may soon come when the 
same or a similar conference will see its way clear to formulate a 
course of English study for preparatory schools, which will be 
generally adopted throughout the country. In the mean time 
it is plain (1) that the spirit of the requirement already leads 
ambitious schools to establish carefully planned courses of this 
sort, which aim at covering more than the mere letter of the 
requirement ; and (2) that the majority of colleges are already 
being brought, by various influences, into substantial uniformity 
in their interpretation of the requirement. 

The actual results achieved by the new requirements may, 
then, be said to be in the main satisfactory. There had been 
two prominent parties in higher English instruc- practical 
tion: one laid much stress on composition as a Results * 
means of training and was afraid to recommend that English 
literature — a subject which demanded such learning and 
cultivation on the part of the teacher — should be included in 
the preparatory curriculum ; the other was inclined to believe 
that composition was a proper exercise only for more mature 
minds, and that literature was the natural and fitting subject 
for school training. The new requirements merged these two 
complementary ideals, and saved the schools the long con- 
flict of opinion that might otherwise have ensued. The 
schools, too, were stimulated to new efforts. Some that had 
virtually paid no attention to English as a preparatory subject 
were willing, now that the requirements became definite and 
uniform, to give a considerable amount of time to English 
study. The colleges and the schools, almost for the first time, 
felt that they had united in securing a desirable reform. Last 
and most important, the definiteness and comparative perma- 
nency of the lists of prescribed books led many preparatory 
schools to draft a rough course in English. They had in mind 
nothing but the technical fulfilment of the requirements ; they 
attempted nothing but the mere routine reading and study of 
the little list of prescribed books. Still they purposed to do 
this systematically. Such courses of study were pitifully meagre, 

19 



290 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

unphilosophic, un-educational, but they were the beginning of 
better things. To secure any regular course in English was a 
great triumph. 

Having satisfied ourselves as to the origin and nature of the 
new entrance requirements in English, we may now pass to a 

brief consideration of their relation to the secondary 
Special . . 

Preparatory course in English. The main points to be borne in 
English. .-, °, . r 

mind seem to be these : — 

(i) The preparatory work in English should form a course in 
itself, extending over four years, with a time allotment of at least 
three periods a week, and very similar to the system of English 
instruction described in this chapter. The mere reading and 
study of the prescribed books will form scarcely a half of this 
work. To restrict the course to the prescribed books and to 
direct preparation for the examination is a bad policy. It goes 
counter to the spirit of the requirements and to the best edu- 
cational thought of modern times. 

(2) It is generally agreed that instruction in English should 
be identical through the first three years of the secondary 
course, both for those who are going to college and for those 
who are not. The only practical objection is based on the fact 
that, if this be the case, it will be necessary, during the second 
and third years, to provide for separate instruction on the books 
prescribed for reading, or else to force students who are not 
going to college to follow the line of reading laid down in the 
college requirements. There could be no plainer illustration of 
the unfortunate policy necessarily adopted by the Conference. 
Still, it is to be said (a) that the treatment of the books pre- 
scribed for reading requires less time than is commonly supposed, 
when the class has already been well trained in several branches 
of English study ; and (b) that the books prescribed are almost 
invariably such as may be used without difficulty as the basis of 
general instruction. 

(3) The statement is also commonly made that in the fourth 
year also the course of English study should be identical for 
both kinds of pupils, but here there is room for a wide differ- 



ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 2QI 

ence of opinion. My own judgment is that pupils closing their 

scholastic education with this year need a broader or more 

advanced course of study than those who will attend college. 

The latter will have abundant opportunities for more training in 

composition, and for the study of the language in its earlier 

forms and of the history of English literature ; the former are 

almost invariably barred from such pursuits, except in so far as 

they follow them unaided. It seems to me only fair, therefore, 

that pupils who are not going to college should have as many 

opportunities as possible of the kinds mentioned. 

As for the college candidate, he has during his last year many 

demands to satisfy in other fields, and can scarcely be expected 

to devote more time to his English studies than he _ 

. ° Importance to 

has in the three years preceding. Furthermore, he the College 

J r & Candidate of 

has a special duty to perform in preparing himself, tne " study " 

with great care, on the books prescribed for study. 
In the larger educational organism which he is about to enter 
there are two points in which he must be highly proficient if he 
wishes to attain success. The first is the power of expressing 
himself clearly ; the second is the power of understanding accu- 
rately and thoroughly what he reads. The work of the first, 
second, and third years of the high school should have started 
the student on the right path in the first respect; if he has 
passed satisfactorily his preliminary entrance examination in 
composition (i. e., on the books prescribed for reading) he may 
turn his chief attention to other matters, — without, however, 
allowing his newly found skill in composition to diminish. It is, 
therefore, to the acquiring of the power of accurate understand- 
ing that he must now address himself with assiduity and am- 
bition, and it is precisely this training that the books prescribed 
for study are best adapted. These he must master, one by one, 
— their language, and, so far as possible, their content. One of 
the first tasks set him in college will be the reading of books for 
the sake of the information they contain, the inferences to be 
drawn from that information, or the aesthetic pleasure or mental 
training derived from following the play of imagination or the 



292 ENGLISH IN SECONDARY EDUCATION 

logical process of thought. To perform this high function,- one 
of the greatest to be performed by the human mind, he must 
have had a full and sound preparation. He must know how to 
grapple with a paragraph, a chapter, a whole book, and to make 
himself lord over it. No ability for skimming, for mere cursory 
reading, will avail. He must know accurately the meaning and 
the force of words, and how to find them out when he does not 
know them. He must be familiar with English syntax and 
versification. He must understand ordinary allusions, and, 
again, how to hunt them down when he is not familiar with them. 
He must be able to follow a line of thought ; to catch the bear- 
ing of details on the whole, — to understand " what it is all 
about." Of course, all this is not learned in a year. His train- 
ing in it began years ago ; it will continue for years still. But 
this is the year which should focus the training that has gone 
before and fit him worthily to receive that which is to come. 
This process means hard, definite, and continued drill on the 
books prescribed for study. It will at times not be a pleasant 
task ; it will shut the pupil off from more interesting and 
more superficial study with his classmates who are not going 
to college, but it will prove the very corner-stone of his college 
work in English, and perhaps of his college work in all subjects 
where he must handle books. 



CHAPTER IV 

THE COURSE OP STUDY 

I. General Principles 

In framing a course of study in English for the schools, we 
must consider what elements are most suitable and necessary, 
and in what order those elements are to be presented. A 
solution of the first problem has been attempted in Chap- 
ters II. and II L of this book; the other, though already 
answered in part, seems to need a fuller discussion. A good 
course of study in any subject must present the elements of 
the subject in a well-recognized and justifiable sequence. 
This sequence may be logical, as in science and mathe- 
matics; or it may be chronological, as in history; but in 
any case it must present the data to be learned in a 
series, the later terms of which shall either rest upon or 
include the earlier terms. It must proceed from the known 
to the unknown, from the simple to the complex, and, 
usually, from the concrete and particular to the abstract 
and general. 

The interest in the study of English has brought forth, in 
the published reports of educational conferences, in the 
reports of school superintendents and of normal school prin- 
cipals, in the books on the teaching of English, and in the 
articles in educational periodicals, many interesting sugges- 
tions as to the order and arrangement of the materials to be 
studied. Among these published opinions may be found con- 
siderable variety in the materials chosen, their order in the 
course, and their relation to each other. The main diversity 
seems to lie in the arrangement of the material. Upon the 
fitness of certain works of literature for educational purposes, 



294 THE COURSE OF STUDY 

and upon the necessity of acquiring certain things in expres- 
sion, an empirical agreement fairly general has long been 
reached. When we come, however, to the arrangement of 
this material, we still find a considerable divergence ; a diver- 
gence which seems to indicate a fundamental difference in 
theories of language instruction. The question at issue 
seems to be, Can the vernacular be taught in the elementary 
and secondary schools by a logical, or at least a highly sys- 
tematized, arrangement of the course ? A high school course 
in English built mainly upon this principle appears in the 
report of the Committee on College Entrance Requirements 
submitted to the National Educational Association in 1899. 
All the work in composition and literature is here arranged 
by years in conformity to the rhetorical divisions of literature 
into narration, description, and exposition. In the fourth year 
the study of life and character in novels and poetry and a 
survey of the history of English literature are offered. This 
arrangement at once appeals to us for its clearness and its 
suggestiveness. But a little reflection raises doubts. Narra- 
tion and description have a trying habit of taking on mixed 
forms, and of assuming varying degrees of importance in the 
same piece of literature. Young students, moreover, are not 
interested so much in classifying literature as in knowing it 
and feeling it ; they are not so ready to discuss the technical 
distinctions of the rhetorician as the relation of the literature 
to life. To me, the rhetorical basis of classification, especially 
when it recommends the treatment of the lyric mainly as a 
form of exposition, seems wrong. The course referred to 
above seems best precisely where it breaks away from its 
schematic rhetorical arrangement. 

If, as has been suggested, we arrange the work according 
to types of literary form, we are again in difficulty. Some of 
the novels ought to be read in the first year of the high 
school, some (like The Vicar of Wakefield) not earlier than 
the third ; some of the lyrics are good for the primary grades, 
some for the fourth year of the high school. Julius Ccesar 



THE COURSE OF STUDY 29$ 

can be well read early in the high school course, Macbeth 
ought to be reserved for the last year, Gareth and Ly?iette 
and The Rime of the Ancient Mari?ier can win an audience 
anywhere between twelve and eighteen years of age. If we 
attempt to fix the place of books in connection with other 
subjects to which they are somehow related, we only increase 
our perplexity. For the authors unhappily did not foresee 
their pedagogic importance, and often neglected to present 
their theme in a form within the comprehension of the appro- 
priate grade. A chronological arrangement of the books 
would be still worse. It would fail in many points to bring 
in the works when they could be best appreciated, and they 
could not be so presented to young pupils as to lead them to 
see the historical evolution of our literature. But one other 
principle of arrangement remains to be considered ; and that, 
fortunately, is the order now generally adopted, the order of 
ease and interest, — the line of least resistance. From the 
first primary grade to the end of the high school, the deter- 
mining thing in choosing literature for the pupils should be 
its adaptability to their interests, their powers, and their 
needs. When this is attained, but not before, let other 
claims be heard. 

It would be poor teaching of English, indeed, which made 
no reference to other subjects of knowledge, no attempt to 
classify types of literature and methods of treatment within 
the same type, or no effort to give a sense of the develop- 
ment of our literature and of its progressive reflection of the 
ideas and feelings of our race. All these things should come 
in, at the appropriate time, as a part of the work. But they 
are matters of instruction, not of the making of the course of 
study. They are not the province of the school board or of 
the superintendent ; they are the teacher's own peculiar 
domain. They cannot be given in an orderly, systematic 
fashion. Order and system may, and indeed must, be at- 
tained. But it must be built up in the mind of the pupil by 
teachers in whom the habit of erecting a symmetrical struc- 



296 THE COURSE OF STUDY 

ture out of loose and unclassified materials is a confirmed 
mental trait. 

In the field of expression the same general principles hold 
good. The short, the simple, the concrete, the interesting, 
must come first. We must pass from the easy to the difficult 
by moderate stages and by frequent iterations. Certain 
things must, however, have an early place, not from their 
interest, but from their necessity. These are mainly the con- 
ventional and arbitrary matters of written language, which 
have the same relation to later work as do the first attempts 
at speech in the nursery. 

II. The Elementary Schools 

The general principles underlying the English work in the 
elementary school have been fully discussed in Chapter II., 
and need not be referred to here. In the choice of the 
literature for these grades it must be remembered that 
interest and comprehension run side by side to a much 
greater extent than in the high school. Interest, therefore, 
is of the first importance. For the most part, such interest 
can be held only by stories with a good deal of action and by 
descriptions at once lively and simple. Fables, fairy stories, 
stories of child life, myths, simple narrative and descriptive 
poems, and very easy longer works, like Hiawatha^ are the 
appropriate material for the first two or three years. For the 
middle years of the course, myths, narratives in prose and 
poetry— especially of the heroic type — biography and the 
brighter essays on nature, like those of Burroughs, are the 
best. For the last two years the reading need not be dif- 
ferent in character from the earlier literature read in the high 
school. The only difference will be in the treatment of it. 

The following outline, taken from the Teachers College 
Record, Vol. I. No. 3 (May, 1900), expresses my views of the 
language work appropriate to the elementary school : — 



THE COURSE OF STUDY 297 



LANGUAGE WORK ARRANGED IN ORDER OF 
SUBJECTS 

I. Spelling. 

(I) Grades 1 1 and 2. Imitative, incidental to the main object of 
learning to write simple sentences. Phonetics introduced 
to give the elements of orthography and pronunciation. 
(II) Grades 3-4. Definite work in spelling as subject of special 
study. 
Grade 3. Diacritical marks taught. Spelling-book used. 
Words learned in lists, classified according to form. Ex- 
ceptions noted. Work both written and oral. Special 
attention to errors in the children's written work. Effort 
made to cultivate a conscientious accuracy in the children, 
but spelling kept subordinate to things of higher value. 
Grade 4. Same plans continued. Definite lessons assigned. 
Use of spelling-book continued. Dictionary used by the 
children. 
Grades 5-7. Same work continued in more advanced form. 
(Ill) Grade 8. Children made to understand that correct spelling 
must come from their unaided efforts. 

II. Writing. 

(I) Begun in Grade 1. Imitative; free, large movements taught ; 
ideo-motor activities aroused. Words and simple sentences 
copied. 
(II) Grades 2-7. Definite instruction in writing. Aim, — to cul- 
tivate (1) freedom, (2) accuracy, (3) speed. Work culmi- 
nates in Grades 5-7. 

III. Arbitrary Signs and Forms. 
(I) Capitals. 

1. Grades 1-3. Beginning of sentences, pronoun I, proper 

names; names of persons, days of week, months, 
streets ; lines of poetry, direct quotations, etc. 

2. Grade 4. Review of previous work ; other usages not 

previously given. 
(II) Punctuation. 

1. Grade 1. Period and question-mark at the end of a 

sentence. 

2. Grade 2. Period after abbreviation ; apostrophe in con- 

tractions and in possessive ; comma after yes and no, 
and with names of persons addressed. 



1 Here and elsewhere in this book the grades of the elementary school are numbered 
from the first year in school. Thus, grade 3 would mean the third year in school, and 
would designate children about nine years of age. 



298 THE COURSE OF STUDY 

3. Grade 3. Quotation marks in undivided quotations ; 

conventional usages in letter- writing; apostrophe in 
possessive. 

4. Grade 4. Exclamation marks ; hyphen ; apostrophe in 

plural possessives ; marks in divided quotations. 

5. Grade 5. Review of work of Grades 3 and 4. 

6. Grades 6-8. Work of preceding years, with special 

reference to the logic of punctuation, and its impor- 
tance in establishing unity and coherence. In Grades 
7 and 8 a definite scheme of rules for punctuation may 
be placed in the children's hands, and turned to critical 
use by giving them examples to punctuate. 

(III) Letter-writing. 

1. Grades 2-5. Exercises in the forms of correspondence, 

and in familiar letter-writing. 

2. Grades 6 and 7. Business letters; formal and informal 

correspondence. 

(IV) Abbreviations. 

1. Grade 2. Mr., Mrs., Rev., Dr., St., Ave., names of 

states, names of months, etc. 

2. Grade 3. Roman numerals ; familiar titles, as Capt., 

Col., Gen., D.D., etc. Common contractions. 

3. Grades 4-8. Common abbreviations needed by the 

general reader, as the opportunity arises in the work 
of the school ; e. g., A.B., A.M., Anon., ibid., A.D., 
B.C., i. e., etc. 
(V) Arrangement of titles of books or chapters, indention of para- 
graphs, etc., Grades 2-4. 

IV. Word Study. 
(I) Form. 

1. Grades 1-4. Recognition of , known words in print and 

in script. Writing and pronunciation of such words. 
Grades 2-4. Diacritical marks. Spelling. Frequent 
practice in writing words to gain facility. 

2. Grades 3-8. Use of dictionary and spelling-book. (See 

also under I. (II). ) Special attention to prefixes and 
suffixes, and analysis of familiar compounds. 
(II) Meanings. 

1. Grades 1 and 2. Given by teacher. 

2. Grades 3-8. Use of dictionaries. See above, (I), 2. 

3. Grades 2-4. Extension of vocabulary, by literature, 

school studies and conversation, by " memory gems," 
and by reproductions, written and oral. 

4. Grades 4-8. Synonyms, homonyms, etymology (given as 

subsidiary), study of things well said in simple litera- 



THE COURSE OF STUDY 299 

ture. Literature and school studies treated partly as a 
means of extending the vocabulary with the increase 
in range and accuracy of concepts. Memory work in 
good literature. 
5. Grades 3-8. Special attention given to idiomatic forms 
of expression. 

V. Organization of Material. 

(I) Whole composition. 

1. Grades 4-8. Topical outlines. 

2. Grades 6-8. Simpler laws of description and narration. 

3. Grades 7 and 8. Instruction in gathering and arranging 

material. 
(II) Paragraphs. 

1. Grade 3. Mechanical form and simplest division taught. 

2. Grades 4 and 5. Elementary principles of paragraphing 

taught from literature and applied in written work. 

3. Grades 6-8. Principles of narrative and descriptive 

paragraphs taught as above, with some slight refer- 
ence to the order of development within the para- 
graph. 

4. Grades 7 and 8. The paragraph treated as a basis of 

composition. Elementary work in simple development 
of expository writing as in history or science lessons. 
Expansion of sentence into paragraph ; condensation 
of paragraph into sentence. 

5. Grades 4-8. Pupils trained to sustained attention and 

memory, for power of dealing with progressively larger 
units of material. Topical recitations. 
(Ill) Sentences. 

1. Grades 1-3. Good sentence form taught mainly by imi- 

tation and empirically. 

2. Grades 4-8. Attention to form of sentence for euphony 

and clearness, in the literature read, and in the writing 
of the pupils. 

3. Grades 5-7. Special work in transformation of sentence 

elements. 

4. Grades 6-8. Study of sentence-structure as determined 

by the needs of emphasis, unity, and logical relation ; 
enforced in Grades 7 and 8 by correction of wrong or 
ineffective sentences. 

5. Grades 4-8. Attention to common errors in expression. 

VI. Subject-matter. 

1. Grade 1. Reproduction of simple sentences and stories, 
mainly oral. 



300 THE COURSE OF STUDY 

2. Grades 2 and 3. Reproduction of stories, picture stories, 

"filling-in " exercises, letter-writing. " Memory gems," 
school lessons. 

3. Grades 4 and 5. Reproduction of reading and other 
lessons ; descriptions of pictures, objects, and familiar 
scenes. 

4. Grades 4-8. Reproductions; descriptions; written ac- 

counts of things seen at first hand. Letter-writing. 

5. Grades 1-6. Practice in dictation. 

VII. Grammar. 

1 . Grades 2-4. Possessives. Empirically, the relation be- 

tween verb and subject, and the objective pronoun 
forms. 

2. Grades 5 and 6. Nouns, verbs, and simpler modifying 

relations ; subsidiary to the interpretation of the read- 
ing and to the composition work. 

3. Grades 7 and 8. Systematic study of grammar, with 

text-book. Grammar viewed throughout as a study of 
forms, and of relations of thought. Function made 
the basis of classification. 

VIII. Criticism of Written Work. 

1. Grades 1-3, direct help from the teacher, aiming to give 

the pupil the desire to do things well. Criticism 
mainly constructive. In Grade 3, simple symbols used 
to indicate the pupil's most common errors. 

2. Grades 4-8. Definite efforts to make the pupil self- 

critical. Symbols of correction used, increasing in 
number from Grade 4 to Grade 8, demanding of the 
pupil that he discover and rectify his mistakes wherever 
this can be enforced without discouraging him. At- 
tention given to the gathering and organization of 
material. 



III. The Secondary Schools 

The discussion of the high school work in Chapter III. has 
included full details as to the order and kinds of instruction 
in language. Some further word as to the arrangement of the 
work in literature seems desirable. 

It is obvious that a good school can, by giving three les- 
sons per week for four years to the subject of English, cover 
all the necessary work in expression and include much more 



THE COURSE OF STUDY 301 

reading than is required in the college entrance list. 1 It was, 
indeed, expected by the Conference which framed the list that 
it should only be representative, and that, while these books 
should remain as the basis of the college entrance examina- 
tions, other books appropriately selected should supplement 
and round out the course. The following order is based 
mainly upon what I conceive to be the capacities and tastes 
of typical high school classes : — 

First Year. Ivanhoe, and two or three of the following of 
Scott's novels : Waverley, Rob Roy, Anne of Geierstein, Old 
Mortality ; Silas Marner, The House of the Seven Gables, The 
Last of the Mohicans, selections from Irving, The Lady of the 
Lake. The interest would here be mainly in plot and char- 
acter, and in the attitudes towards life of romantic and real- 
istic fiction. It is especially desirable in the first year that 
the number of types presented be few, and fully exemplified. 

Second Year. The Vision of Sir Launfal and other selec- 
tions from Lowell, selections from Bryant and Emerson, and 
an outline history of American Literature. The De Coverley 
Papers, and selected papers from The Tatler and The Specta- 
tor (with especial reference to their historical interest), The 
Rime of the Ancient Mariner, The Idylls of the King. 

Third Year. Julius Ccesar, The Merchant of Venice, As 
You Like It, with reference to the plot, the character, the 
essential idea, and the differences between tragedy and 
comedy. Irving's Life of Goldsmith and The Vicar of Wake- 
field, Carlyle's Essay on Burns and selected poems from 
Burns, Macaulay's Life of Johnson and Essay on Addison. 



1 The list, as discussed in Chapter III., is that which is at present in 
force. At the last meeting of the Conference (1902) certain changes 
were made. Irving's Life of Goldsmith was substituted for The Vicar of 
Wakefield, and Macaulay's Life of fohnson for Macaulay's Essay on Mil- 
ton, and three of The Ldylls of the King [Launcelot and Elaine, The Pass- 
ing of Arthur, and Gareth and Lynette) for The Princess. The Lady of 
the Lake was added to the reading list, and Macbeth and fulius Ccesar 
were interchanged in their positions on the lists for reading and study 
respectively. ^ ^ m Q^J^ ^ ^^ <^ ^j^ 



302 THE COURSE OF STUDY 

Fourth Year. Burke's Speech on Conciliation, Milton's 
Minor Poems and Books I. -IV. oi Paradise Lost, Macau! ay's 
Essay on Milton, Tennyson's The Princess, Macbeth, selected 
poems from Wordsworth, Keats, or Browning, the Prologue 
to Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. An outline history of Eng- 
lish literature. 



II 

The Teacher and his Training 



CHAPTER V 

THE TRAINING OP THE TEACHER 
BIBLIOGRAPHY 

I. General References : 

A. Bain. On Teaching English. Longmans. 1887. 

Fred Burk. The Training of Teachers. Atlantic Monthly, 

LXXX. 547. 
P. Chubb. The Teaching of English in the Elementary and the 

Secondary School. Macmillan. 1902. 

A. S. Cook. The Teaching of English. Atlantic Monthly, 
LXXXVII. 710. 

B. A. Hinsdale. Teaching the Language- Arts : Speech, Reading, 
Composition. Appleton. 1896. 

S. S. Laurie. Language and Linguistic Method. Cambridge, 

University Press. 1890. 
D. Sal^lilii^The Art of Teaching. Longmans. 1899. 
See also therarticles of Dr. Samuel Thurber in the General Bibliog- 
raphy at the close of this book. 

II. On the special training of the teacher of rhetoric and composition, 
see 

J. P. Genung. The Teacher's Outfit in Rhetoric. School Re- 
view, III. 405. 

S. Thurber. The following articles : Suggestions of English Study 
for Teachers of English, The [Syracuse] Academy, V. 513 ; Milder 
Suggestions of English Study for Secondary Teachers, The [Syra- 
cuse] Academy, VI. 167 ; Admonitions as to the Primary Teach- 
ing of English, Boston, 1894; The Conditions needed for the 
successful Teaching of English Composition, School Review, 
II. 13; Five Axioms of Composition Teaching, School Review, 
V. 7. 
The subject is treated by implication in most of the books and 

articles listed under Rhetoric and Composition in the General 

Bibliography at the close of this book. 

III. On special training for the teaching of grammar, see 

P. A. Barbour. The Teaching of English Grammar. Ginn. 1901. 
O. P. Emerson. The Teaching of English Grammar. School 
Review, V. 129. 

20 



306 THE TRAINING OF THE TEACHER 

S. Thurber. Suggestions of English Study for Teachers of English. 

The [Syracuse] Academy, V. 513. 

For the three phases of language study recommended to teachers 
of grammar, see 

{a) On the history of the English language: 
O. F. Emerson. The History of the English Language. Macmillan. 

1895. 
H. Sweet. A New English Grammar, Logical and Historical. 

Clarendon Press. 1892. 
L. Kellner. Historical Outlines of English Syntax. Macmillan. 

1892. 
B. Morris. Historical Outlines of English Accidence. Macmillan. 

1875- 

{b) On comparative philology : 

H. Sweet. The History of Language. Macmillan. 1900. 

O. Jespersen. Progress in Language. Macmillan. 1894. 

H. Paul. Principles of the History of Language. Macmillan. 1889. 

P. Giles. A Short Manual of Comparative Philology for Classical 

Students. Macmillan. 1895. 

(c) On the psychology of speech : 
E. B. Titchener. A Primer of Psychology. Macmillan. 1898. 

See Index s. v. Gesture, Language, Word. 
J. M. Baldwin. Mental Development in the Child and the Race : 

Methods and Processes. Second Edition. Macmillan. 1900. 

Pp. 409-475- 

J. M. Baldwin. Social and Ethical Interpretations in Mental 
Development. Macmillan. 1897. Chapter IV. 

J. Collins. The Genesis and Dissolution of the Faculty of Speech. 
Macmillan. 1898. 
IV. On training for the teaching of literature, see 

H. Corson. The Aims of Literary Study. Macmillan. 1895. 

J. Churton Collins. The Study of English-Literature. Macmillan. 
1891. 

A. S. Cook. Preparation for the Teaching of Secondary English. 
Journal of Pedagogy, XL 284. 

H. C. Beeching. How not to Teach English Literature. Long- 
mans' Magazine, XXXVIII. 350. 

Brander Matthews. Suggestions for Teachers of American Litera- 
ture. Educational Review, XXI. 11. 

Success in teaching English, as in teaching any other subject 
in the curriculum, depends primarily not upon training, but 
upon the possession of a special talent. The teacher who has 
not a passion and an aptitude for imparting instruction in Eng- 
lish, who does not feel that it is the great thing in life to live 



THE TRAINING OF THE TEACHER 307 

for, and a thing, if necessary, to die for, who does not realize 
at every moment of his classroom work that he is performing 

the special function for which he was foreordained „ . „ 
1 special 

from the foundation of the world, — such a teacher Talent 

. . Necessary, 

cannot profit greatly by any course of training, how- 
ever ingeniously devised or however thoroughly applied. He 
lacks the one thing needful. On the other hand, a special 
talent for teaching English is not in itself a guarantee of suc- 
cess. Unaided, it will soon reach its limit. It cannot attain 
to its highest efficiency without submitting itself to a severe 
and protracted discipline. 

The purpose of special training is frequently misunderstood. 
It is thought to be for the sake of giving the teacher expertness 
in his subject and a knowledge of methods of teach- what xrain- 
ing. In a sense both of these aims are right. But ing can d0# 
they are subordinate. The main purpose is to give the teacher, 
not knowledge of his subject, but self-knowledge ; not knowledge 
of methods of teaching, but resources to meet the exigencies 
of the classroom. Thus the effect of a proper course of train- 
ing will be in the first place to reveal to the teacher his own 
powers and limitations. He will learn by it how much he 
really knows and how much he has yet to learn. The peculiar 
defects and peculiar virtues of his special aptitude will be 
brought home to him. He will be put in a position to make 
the most of himself. But a further result of training will be 
to make him more resourceful. Knowing the fundamental 
principles of his subject, he will- be able to give it greater 
depth and substance, and thus to make it a better nutri- 
ment for growing minds. Drawing his illustrative matter from 
a wider range, it will be easier for him than for the un- 
trained teacher to make it various and interesting. The trained 
teacher will also be better able than the untrained to take 
advantage quickly of new theories about the teaching of 
English. He will not need to be told by others, as does the 
untrained teacher, whether the novel ideas attractively set out 
before him are educational forces or educational fads. If his 



308 THE TRAINING OF THE TEACHER 

training has been what it should be, he will know of his own 
knowledge. 

To come now to details, it is obvious that certain general 
requirements will be laid upon all who teach English ; certain 
other requirements will concern more especially those who teach 
particular branches of English, as composition, grammar, and 
literature. In what follows these two aspects of the teacher's 
equipment will be considered separately. 



I. General Qualifications 

(i) Among the general requisites may be mentioned, first, 
ability to speak and write the English language with clearness, 
Ability to use accuracy, and freedom from bookishness. This qual- 
Good English. ifi ca tion is of fundamental importance, and should be 
insisted upon ; but it must not be misinterpreted. It cannot be 
held necessary, for example, that the teacher should, on the one 
hand, illustrate in his own writing and speaking the " graces of 
diction," so called, or, on the other, that he should express 
himself in a severe and academic manner. 1 There is no style 
peculiarly appropriate to a teacher of English, nor one from 
which he may be required to abstain, unless it is a bad style. 
It is even possible — and the fact has been established by 
numerous examples — for a teacher whose mode of composition 
is singularly defective to train up, by force of enthusiasm and 
sympathy, coupled with ardent admiration of good style in 
others, writers of the first rank. Nevertheless, it is highly 
desirable that all teachers of English should be able to express 
themselves naturally and logically and with taste. 

Although the foundation for such an equipment must be laid 
early in life, in the grammar school and the high school, yet 



1 " How often has it been my experience to have spoken to a peda- 
gogic audience on some topic that I deemed important, and to find, when 
the question was opened for discussion, that I had before me the task of 
defending my pronunciation or my syntax instead of my thesis." Dr. 
Samuel Thurber, in the School Review, I. 651. 



THE TRAINING OF THE TEACHER 309 

every teacher of English, even of mature years, may do some- 
thing to improve himself in this regard. He can seize every 
opportunity for practice in writing ; he can watch 
his conversation ; he can prepare himself carefully cultivation 
for his daily talks to his students. A teacher who m ng s ' 
has the ambition and the will power to put himself through 
such a course of discipline, can in a few months bring about a 
marked improvement in his use of English. 1 

One obstacle which lies in the way of most teachers, but es- 
pecially of teachers who have been trained in certain of the 

normal schools, is the tradition of a stiff, frigid, and 

1 , 1 • • . School- 

vet inaccurate style of speech and writing sometimes master's 

„ English, 

denominated " schoolmaster's English. The power 

of this speech-tradition to corrupt the mental faculties is as 
striking as it is natural. Walking through the halls of a school 
where such speech is traditional, one may see the evidences of it 
in the faces oiS^ie students. Sitting in the classroom, one may 
fairly hear the mental machinery creak. Singularly enough, 
the mastery of this iron-jointed dialect, or rather the being 
mastered by it, is not incompatible with violations of taste ; 
so that one who examines the writings of teachers who are ad- 
dicted to it will frequently find, scattered through the arid waste, 
hideous artificial flowers of rhetoric, anecdotes of questionable 
propriety, and sometimes humour approximating to horse-play. 
The teacher of English who has been so unfortunate as to acquire 
this scholastic jargon and its vicious concomitants should take 
pains to rid himself of it by every means in his power. First, 
he should endeavour to cultivate his taste by the extensive read- 
ing of simple, unforced prose, — the writings of John Burroughs, 
Philip Gilbert Hamerton, W. H. Hudson {Idle Days in Pata- 
gonia and The Naturalist in La Plata) will be of some help for 
this purpose. In the next place, he should make an effort to 
displace the characteristic vocabulary of the jargon. Favourite 
words and phrases should be noted down, and hackneyed 



1 See Palmer's Self- Cultivation in English. 



310 THE TRAINING OF THE TEACHER 

terms, when they are discovered, laid upon the shelf. By the 

exercise of a little labour and some vigilance, the teacher may 

in a comparatively short time rid himself of this disease of 

speech. 

(2) In the second place, it is important that the teacher of 

English should be well read in English literature and English 

Knowledge literary history. 1 That he should have expert knowl- 

of English J J . 

Literature. edge of the whole range of literature in English is 

of course out of the question ; but he ought at least on the one 
hand to have made a careful survey of the entire field and to 
have acquired definite ideas of the course of literary develop- 
ment, and on the other hand to have formed an intimate ac- 
quaintance with the leading English classics. As regards the 
history of literature, the greatest danger is perhaps that the 
teacher will rest content with biography and history instead of 
pursuing the study of literature itself. Literature has its own 
peculiar record, which in a sense is distinct from the lives of the 
men who wrote it or from the times in which it appeared, closely 
as it is related to both. Not to grasp the essential facts and 
laws of literary evolution is to lack a most important clue to the 
proper study of literature. Again, as regards literary master- 
pieces, the greatest danger is that the teacher will mistake vague 
recollections of the utterances of critics, more or less eminent, 
for acquaintance with the works themselves. What is needed 
in this particular of his training is, first, appreciative reading, 
which through sympathy will bring the reader into the closest 
possible contact with the mind of the writer, and then critical 
reading, which through the exercise of the judgment will reveal 
the technical sources of the writer's power. 2 Neither kind can 
be dispensed with. The first is needed in order that the 
appreciation of literature may be genuine and vital, not merely 
formal ; and the second in order that the appreciation aroused 



1 The word " English " will be used here and hereafter in the sense of 
English and American. 

2 See "Two Problems of Composition Teaching," by J. V. Denney, 
Contributions to Rhetorical Theory, No. 4. 



THE TRAINING OF THE TEACHER 311 

by the first kind of reading may not degenerate into 

sentimentality. 

How extensive ought this reading to be ? How much prose, 

how much poetry should a candidate for a position as teacher 

of English be able to call his own intimate posses- 
.-„... , . rr . . , Extent of the 

sion ? I his is a difficult question, and any answer Teacher's 

to it, however carefully guarded, is liable to miscon- 
struction. Nevertheless an answer will be risked. As a con- 
venient measure of literature in bulk, we may take Professor 
Winchester's Five Short Courses of Reading. 1 Let the candidate 
examine Professor Winchester's lists of masterpieces ; if he finds 
that he has familiar personal acquaintance with not more than 
two-thirds of the works there cited, he may conclude that as 
concerns the particular under consideration he is poorly equipped 
for a position as teacher of English in a secondary school. He 
should hasten to read the other third. Let him not infer, how- 
ever, that when he has read the remaining third his equipment 
will be complete. Of the reading of English masterpieces there 
is literally no end. 

A word of advice may be given at this point in regard to 
courses of reading. Such courses are often fruitless because 
they are undertaken for no definite purpose, courses of 
Nothing is more futile than to plod wearily through Readin g- 
great tracts of prose and poetry — Wordsworth's Excursion 
will serve as an example in both kinds — just for the sake of 
being able to say that they have been traversed. On the other 
hand, a definite purpose on the reader's part will in time give 
interest and even charm to any worthy piece of literature, no 
matter how distasteful it may have been at the start. Such a 
purpose may always be provided by this simple device : Let 
the reader ask himself a question that can be answered only by 
a perusal of the work. For example, suppose the case of a 
teacher who has never read any of Thackeray's novels. He — 



1 C. T. Winchester, Five Short Courses of Reading in English Litera- 
ture with Biographical and Critical References. Ginn. 1892. 



312 THE TRAINING OF THE TEACHER 

or more likely she — has not found in them, we may suppose, 
so far as he has gone, anything likable. Now such a teacher, 
instead of being asked to read Thackeray as a matter of con- 
science, should be referred to the following passage in Brownell's 
Victorian Prose Masters (pp. 26-27) : — 

" Nothing better attests George Eliot's scientific interest in 
character than her constant exhibition of its evolution. This is 
one of her real contributions to literature. The effect of circum- 
stances in developing a character like Lydgate, for example, 
the difference between Rosamond as she is first introduced and 
when she leaves the stage, are almost Spencerian demonstra- 
tions. This, as Mr. Albert Dicey, I think, has observed, was 
an unknown thing in fiction when George Eliot began to write, 
and it is naturally savoured by the palate of our day, which seeks 
a taste of science even in its literary confections. But it is 
needless to point out that it implies an instinct quite lacking in 
Thackeray, in whose view character is spectacle, significant 
spectacle, to be sure, and its significance often copiously insisted 
upon, but essentially spectacle, and not the illustrative incarna- 
tion of interesting traits and tendencies. This is also Shake- 
speare's view, it may be added, as it is clearly the distinctly 
literary view as opposed to the scientific." 

The teacher of English unfamiliar with Thackeray, who, after 
reading this extract, will not at once (if there is opportunity) sit 
down to an eager perusal of Vanity Fair or Pendennis, in order 
to verify the criticism, has seriously mistaken his vocation. 

The question started for this purpose need not be abstruse ; 
indeed, the simpler it is the better ; but having raised it, the 
teacher should pursue it relentlessly through the work in hand. 
If after the chase is begun and the reader is in full cry, the work 
itself should become so interesting that it is read for its own 
sake, just for the enjoyment of it, doubtless no great harm will 
be done. 1 



1 This is not the place to do more than to illustrate this method of 
self-propulsion, so to speak, into an acquaintance with English classics. 
Any good critical essay will suggest unsolved literary problems which 
can be used in the way suggested above. 



THE TRAINING OF THE TEACHER 313 

(3) Granted a mastery of the mother-tongue and a fair ac- 
quaintance with English literature, it remains to be said that no 
teacher has an adequate preparation for teaching j- or eig n 
English, even in the elementary grades, who has Lan s ua ^ es - 
not been thoroughly grounded in at least one foreign language, 
ancient or modern. It is a commonplace of education that the 
mother-tongue can be understood and appreciated only by 
those who have made some progress in an alien tongue ; and 
if the knowledge of one foreign tongue is good for the teacher, 
a knowledge of two is still better. What this language, or these 
languages, shall be in any individual case is a question which 
must be left to be decided by the teacher's opportunities ; but 
if there is room for choice and but two languages can be studied, 
doubtless the most advantageous combination is Latin and 
German. 

A knowledge of Old English is also desirable, though it can 
be more easily dispensed with, or compounded for, than a 

knowledge of the classics or of the modern lan- 

t j ^u t^ Old English. 

guages. Important on many grounds as Old Eng- 
lish is, the contention that it can rival Greek, Latin, French, or 
German as a quickening force, as a means of culture, is quite 
idle. If the teacher in his preparatory work must choose 
between Latin and Old English, or German and Old English, 
he should not hesitate long. But granting that the other lan- 
guages have been studied, the claims of Old English are con- 
siderable. Only through the systematic study of the older 
forms is it possible to gain a just idea of the genius of the 
language as a whole. A knowledge of the older forms is 
also essential to an understanding of the development of the 
language and of its present condition. A teacher, then, who 
has traced the stream of English speech from its fountain head 
downward, has a distinct advantage over one who is familiar 
only with its modern aspects. 

Old English, however, is far from being a difficult study, 
especially to one who has some knowledge of German. An 
hour a day for a school year spent upon some such text-book 



314 THE TRAINING OF THE TEACHER 

as Professor A. S. Cook's First Book in Old English, will give 
the teacher an acquaintance with the grammar and an induc- 
tion into the literature : and if this brief study be 
Self- ' J 

Cultivation judiciously supplemented by a summers term at a 
in Old English. J j ft- j 

college or university under some one who has 
expert knowledge, the subject may be fairly mastered, for all 
practical purposes, in a twelvemonth. The teacher of English, 
therefore, to whom the Anglo-Saxon grammar and literature 
long remain a sealed book, is wholly without excuse for his 
ignorance. 



II. Special Qualifications 

The preceding qualifications are general in character, and such 
as may be required of all teachers of English. It is now desir- 
able to consider briefly the special preparation demanded for 
the teaching of specific phases of English, as rhetoric and 
composition, grammar, and literature. 

(i) The essentials in the equipment of a teacher of compo- 
sition are partly matters of skill, partly matters of knowledge. 

Among those belonging to the first class the most 
Composition: . ^, , ,. . , 

Theme- important, or at any rate the least dispensable, is 

skill in reading and correcting themes. Intrinsi- 
cally, skill in this particular is not perhaps to be rated very high. 
It may be no more than a knack. One may conceivably be able 
to read themes rapidly and correct them accurately, and yet be 
good for very little else. Still, so much of the teacher's happi- 
ness and success depends upon this knack that it must be set 
down as a sine qua non. The born teacher of composition 
reads themes rapidly and interestedly, and with the exhilaration 
which comes from the successful performance of a function for 
which one is specially adapted. If then, after a fair trial under 
favourable circumstances, the teacher finds the reading of themes 
slow, irksome, and depressing, he may fairly conclude that he is 
not a born teacher of composition. He is out of his element 
and he cannot by any possibility be entirely successful in this 



THE TRAINING OF THE TEACHER 315 

field unless he can employ some one else to do the correcting 
for him or haply can devise some method, as yet unguessed, by 
which essay-correcting may be done away with. 1 Although 
ability to do this kind of work well and easily is a natural 
aptitude, it is, like any other gift, susceptible of great improve- 
ment. If it is present in some degree, but undeveloped, a 
systematic effort should be made to cultivate it. 2 

(2) As a second qualification of the teacher of composition, 
may be named scholarship in the history and theory of rhetoric. 

Such training has often been decried on the 

Advanced 

ground that the teacher who has made a pro- study of 
fe r Rhetoric, 

found study of rhetorical theory will be disposed 

to unload his erudition on the class. It is doubtful whether ex- 
perience will bear this out, but even if it should, ignorance of 
one's subject is no proper safeguard in the classroom. It is the 
business of the specialist to be as wise as he can in his own line 
of work. 3 Furthermore, the teacher who has made an exhaus- 
tive study of rhetorical principles has a real advantage in the 



1 For a discussion of possible substitutes, see the report of the investi- 
gation by the Pedagogical Section of the Modern Language Association, in 
the School Review for May, 1902, " The Undergraduate Study of Com- 
position." The following anecdote quoted (from memory) from Andrew 
Clark's Stories of Lincoln College illustrates a method, if not of doing 
away with theme-correcting, at least of reducing it to its lowest terms. 
The scene was Mark Pattison's room at Oxford. Pattison was standing 
with his back to the grate smoking, when a knock came at the door and 
to him there entered an undergraduate with a composition in his hand. 
Pattison took the paper, quickly ran his eye over it, then crumpled it up 
in his hand and threw it in the face of the student, who immediately left 
the room. Not a word was spoken on either side. 

2 For this purpose perhaps no exercise is better than impromptu oral 
correction before a class. The following method is suggested. The 
themes are placed by the students in a basket on the teacher's desk just 
before the beginning of the recitation. The teacher has no opportunity 
of examining the papers in advance. At the opening of the hour he 
gathers up a handful of them, and reading them aloud makes corrections 
as he goes. The unskilled teacher will find that the successful perform- 
ance of the task will try his powers, particularly his powers of concentra- 
tion and discrimination, to the utmost. 

8 For a contrary view, see the remarks of Dr. Samuel Thurber at the 



316 THE TRAINING OF THE TEACHER 

classroom over one who has not done so. Not only is he de- 
livered from the tyranny of the text-book, but if his study has 
been of the right kind he knows ways of enriching and enliven- 
ing the subject which are denied to the teacher untrained in this 
respect. Above all, a thorough-going study of rhetoric absolves 
the teacher from the finicalness and intolerance, characteristic 
indeed of the sciolist in any line of thought, but peculiarly char- 
acteristic of the sciolist in rhetoric. 

(3) From composition we may pass to grammar. It is a 
common saying that grammar is the worst-taught subject in the 

English curriculum. If the saying be true, the 
Grammar. . , ... - . . 

reason for the condition of things it represents is 

not far to seek, for few teachers have made special preparation 
for teaching English grammar. Such preparation, in addition 
to a familiar acquaintance with the best school text-books, should 
include (1) a study of the development of the English language 
from the earliest times to the present ; (2) a study of the gen- 
eral principles of comparative philology, or the science of lan- 
guage ; (3) a study of the psychology of speech. Though all 
of these subjects are abstruse, they have fortunately fallen of late 
into the hands of persons who have treated them with the utmost 
simplicity. In their main principles they are now accessible to 
every teacher. 1 Of the three subjects specified, the first is 
doubtless the most indispensable, for a teacher who is ignorant of 
the history of his mother-tongue is disqualified for the teaching of 
its grammar ; but an acquaintance with linguistics and with 
psychology, even though it be but a limited acquaintance, will be 
found of great advantage. The comparative study of language 
will free the student from a superstitious reverence for gram- 
matical rules, and give him an insight into the true nature 



eighth annual meeting of the New England Association of Colleges and 
Preparatory Schools, published in the School Review, I. 650-655. 

1 See the Bibliography at the beginning of this chapter. The most 
elementary books under each of these three heads are perhaps (1) 
Emerson's History of the English Language ; (2) Sweet's History of 
Language; (3) Titchener's Primer of Psychology. 



THE TRAINING OF THE TEACHER 317 

of usage and idiom. From a study of the psychology of speech 
he will learn through what processes the child acquires his native 
tongue, and how the various elements of the language present 
themselves to the child-mind at different stages of its develop- 
ment. The total outcome of this study should be to give the 
teacher a new conception of the meaning of English grammar 
and its place in the curriculum. He should cease to regard it 
as a study merely of abstract rules and formulas ; he should 
come to see that the underlying subject is virtually the same as 
that which underlies composition and literature, namely, the 
expressive and communicative activities of the English-speaking 
race. And he should come to see that in teaching grammar his 
chief duty is to awaken the minds of his students to the mean- 
ing of their own familiar modes of expression. This knowledge, 
of itself, if it could be brought home to the consciousness of the 
teacher, would effect a revolution in the teaching of English 
grammar. 

(4) Of preparation for the teaching of literature the most 

important requisites — acquaintance with the English classics 

and with literary history — have been specified in 

. Literature. 
the general requirements for all teachers of English. 

A teacher whose special subject is literature should naturally go 
farther in the same direction. He should know his classics 
more intimately, and he should have a more thorough acquaint- 
ance with the facts of literary history. Experience has shown 
that the best method of securing this profounder knowledge of 
literature is to make a prolonged and exhaustive study of a 
single period, a single author, or a single problem. 

(5) Besides knowing the masterpieces and literary history, it 

is the duty of every teacher of English literature to form some 

acquaintance with the underlying principles of liter- 

1 1 1 j 1 ■ Principles of 

ary criticism. Inasmuch as these are dependent, in Literary 

Criticism. 
the modern formulation of them, upon aesthetics 

and psychology, some knowledge of these latter subjects is also 

to be desired. How far such studies should be pursued is an 

open question, but certainly the teacher of literature who can to 



318 THE TRAINING OF THE TEACHER 

some extent derive his principles of criticism and his standards 
of appreciation independently, has a distinct advantage over the 
teacher who is compelled to take his principles as he finds them 
from the pages of a text-book. The teacher psychologically and 
aesthetically equipped is less likely to be bewildered by the con- 
tradictory opinions of belligerent critics, or to be overawed by 
the solemn platitudes of self-constituted authorities. Knowing 
the sources from which critical principles are derived, he is able 
to reconcile the seeming inconsistencies of rival theories or 
to explode their fallacies. He is also less likely to be tainted 
with the shallow sentimentalism which in some schools takes the 
place of intelligent appreciation. 

(6) A phase of literary criticism which has received much 

attention of late and is certain to receive more, is the study 

known as comparative literature. For a thorough 

Comparative comprehension of literary history, this study is doubt- 
Literature, i . • 1 -| r 

less as important as is the study of comparative 

philology for the understanding of grammar. Although the sub- 
ject has not as yet gained a foothold in many universities and 
although its principles are but ill defined, the ambitious teacher 
of literature will do well to follow with some care the progress of 
this branch of his chosen subject. 1 The recent establishment 
of the Journal of Comparative Literature, edited by Professor 
George E. Woodberry of Columbia University and published by 
McClure, Phillips and Company, of New York, gives promise of 
a rapid growth of interest in the subject in this country. 



1 For the chief authorities on Comparative Literature, see Gayley and 
Scott's Introduction to the Methods and Materials of Literary Criticism, 
Ginn, 1899, pp. 248-278. 



CHAPTER VI 

THE PHILOSOPHY OP THE ASSIGNMENT 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

The subject of this chapter has not hitherto received special attention. 
For a discussion of the principles of method in general, see such works as 
W. James. Talks to Teachers on Psychology. Holt. 1899. Pp. 91- 

Charles De Garmo. The Essentials of Method: A Discussion of the 

Essential Forms of Right Methods of Teaching. Heath. 1889. 
Charles De Garmo. Herbart and the Herbartians. Scribner. 1896. 

Pp. 130-140. 
Charles A. McMurry. The Elements of the General Method : Based 

on the Principles of Herbart. Public School Pub. Co. 1892. 
A. H. Garlick. A New Manual of Method. Longmans. 1896. 
A. Sidgwick. On Stimulus. In Three Lectures on Subjects Connected 

with the Practice of Education. Cambridge, University Press. 1883. 

In newspaper offices the term " assignment " is used to de- 
note the managing editor's allotment of a particular task of 

reporting to a particular member of the staff. The 

11 • t 1 11 1 1 Meaning of 

instructions are usually written in a book called the the Term 
„ 1 , ,1 r^, . ■, te „ • Assignment. 

■ assignment book. 1 his word " assignment 7 it 

is proposed to borrow from newspaper usage and employ in a 
somewhat broader sense. It will here be used for certain class- 
room procedures the general object of which is to induce in 
the student a state of mind favourable to composition. Em- 
ployed in this sense, the term includes the following steps : 
(1) the announcement of the subject; (2) stimulation of interest 
in the subject ; (3) arousal of a desire to write upon it ; 
(4) suggestion of a method of procedure in writing ; (5) pre- 
cautions against wasted effort. Each of these points will be 
considered in turn. 



320 THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE ASSIGNMENT 

(i) The first topic suggests the interesting question whether 
it is better for the student to select his own subject or for the 
Selection of teacher to select a subject for him. Advantages 
a Subject. ma y ^ urged on both sides. On the one hand, it 
may be said, first, that to choose a proper subject for an essay 
is a valuable mental exercise. It not only trains the student's 
judgment ; it increases his knowledge by compelling him to 
search his mental stores and take stock of his available resources. 
Secondly, the exercise is of practical value to the student 
because it is a task which he will be compelled to perform often 
in later years. In the school of life there will be no teacher at 
his side to choose his subject for him. On the other hand, it 
is clear, first, that much of the mental effort expended in choos- 
ing is of no practical value, because it is misdirected and desul- 
tory. The student in search of a subject ought theoretically to 
use his judgment, but practically he does no such thing. In- 
stead of ransacking his mental stores and making comparison 
of competing subjects, he casts his eye lazily and unobservantly 
over the field of things in general. Delaying his choice until the 
eleventh hour, he chooses at last in a panic and quite at ran- 
dom. Such a procedure as this is relaxing rather than strength- 
ening. Secondly, to meet the argument that training in choice 
of a subject is useful in later life, the reply may be made that in 
the actual struggle for existence choice among unlimited possi- 
bilities is extremely rare. It may even be said that choice of any 
kind is the exception rather than the rule. Men who make a 
business of writing do not spend much time or energy in choos- 
ing subjects ; subjects are chosen for them. Reporters on news- 
papers, for example, are told explicitly what they shall write ; it 
is seldom that they have an opportunity to select their subjects. 
Reviewers write upon the books that are sent to them for 
review. Novelists and essayists, although they are popularly 
supposed to have great liberty, are as a matter of fact pursued 
relentlessly by ideas which cry for utterance and will not let 
them rest. The true man of letters never has occasion to say, 
" What in the world shall I write upon next? " His sentiment is 



THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE ASSIGNMENT 321 

more likely to be, u How shall I find time for all the things that 
I must write about? " It is the same with lawyers, doctors, and 
other professional men ; when they write as professional men, 
they have little opportunity for choice. The character of their 
work determines within narrow limits the subjects of their com- 
positions. The only exception to this rule is the person who is 
taken unawares ; the man, for example, who is called upon un- 
expectedly to " say something " at a banquet or to write an 
original sentiment in a young lady's album. In such an emer- 
gency (fortunately rare in the experience of most) the power of 
choosing rapidly an appropriate subject is doubtless an advan- 
tage. Setting this exceptional case aside, certain positive advan- 
tages accrue from the teacher's taking the selection of the 
subject into his own hands. First, he can in this way consult the 
genuine needs of his students instead of humouring their whims. 
Second, he can devise a progressive series of topics, covering 
a definite range of subject-matter. And finally, it is in his power 
to secure the advantage which comes from having the entire 
class write upon the same subject. From these considerations 
the conclusion may be drawn that in the majority of cases it is 
better for the teacher to choose the subject for the student than 
for the student to choose the subject for himself. If choice is 
given, it should be limited. The student may be allowed to 
choose one of two alternative subjects, or one of three or four 
aspects of the same subject. 

Not to neglect, however, the benefit which undoubtedly 
comes from training of the selective power, the teacher should 
now and then give a special exercise in choosing a a Special 
subject. This exercise should be carefully prepared suS? 6 
for, and should take the form of a discussion. The oosm s- 
teacher should lead the class to imagine a definite situation or 
emergency where the choice of a subject is necessary and urgent. 
He should then ask not only, " What subject should you choose 
in such an emergency ? " but " How would you go about the 
choice of it ? " " Why would you choose such and such a sub- 
ject rather than another ? " In other words, the teacher should 

21 



322 THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE ASSIGNMENT 

try to draw out from the class and impress upon them the fun- 
damental principles of subject-choosing. Adroitly managed, 
such an exercise might be of considerable value. 

If the teacher is, then, to choose the subject for the student, 
it is desirable to consider next the principles upon which his 
Principles of cn °i ce sna ^ De made. These may be briefly stated 
Choice. as follows : (i) The subject chosen must be one 

that is interesting to the teacher. (2) The subject chosen 
must be one that is interesting, or that can be made interesting, 
to the students. 

Teachers of English sometimes think that the first principle 
can be neglected. They allow tradition to impose upon them 
Freedom of subjects for which they care little or nothing. This 
the Teacher. j s a se rious mistake, and is a potent cause of indif- 
ferent composition teaching. It must be borne in mind that 
after the essays are written they must be read, and it is the 
teacher who will read them. He ought to read with intense 
interest and a kindling enthusiasm. But if the subjects are 
distasteful to him, his reading, despite the most conscientious 
efforts, will be half-hearted and ineffectual. It is, then, of the 
utmost importance for the teacher to understand that in his se- 
lection he is — theoretically at least — as free as air. The world 
is before him, where to choose. There is no corner of the field 
of literature, science, art, philosophy, or humanity which is not 
his to cultivate if he desires. Subject to a single limitation — 
the second principle — he may as legitimately draw the subjects 
for the composition work from the mediaeval romances as from 
current politics, from the Homeridae or the Dutch school of 
painting as from the germ theory or the South African war. 

In the second place, the subject should be actually or poten- 
tially interesting to the students and adapted to their powers. 

This is not so serious a limitation upon the teacher's 
Adaptation . . , .. , , . . . 

of Subject choice as some teachers are disposed to think. A 

study of children's minds will show that the phases 

of thought or human activity are few indeed in which they have 

not some rudimentary concern, some germ of interest capable 



THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE ASSIGNMENT 323 

of development. The difficulty has been that teachers of com- 
position have conceived of subjects quite abstractly, as things 
which clamour to be written upon quite apart from the needs 
and personality of the individuals who are to write upon them. 
Substitute for the term " subjects " the word " interests," and 
the question takes on a different aspect. Subjects, in the ab- 
stract sense, may not be easy to find, but student interests are 
always present in abundance. 

To call upon students to give expression to their interests 
does not necessarily mean, however, that the teacher is to fol- 
low passively the students' whims and fancies. It Healthy 
is the teacher's business to detect and encourage, fcrterests. 
not interests at large, but vital interests, — healthy interests. 
There are such things as unhealthy interests, and these it is his 
business to suppress. 

(2) Assuming that a subject has been found which is inter- 
esting to the teacher and potentially interesting to the members 
of the class, the next step is to make the potential Ar 0nsal f 
interest actual, — if possible, to make the student interest 
feel that this subject is the most fascinating thing in the world. 
There are at least four ways of arousing such an interest. The 
first is by connecting the subject with other subjects already 
known to be interesting. In order that he may use this kind of 
stimulus intelligently, the wise teacher will make a special study 
of his pupils. He will learn their likes and dislikes and take 
stock of their ideas. Knowing these things, he will next seek 
for some point of contact between the new subject and the ideas 
already in their minds. Somehow he will find a place in the 
students' present scheme of interests for the new subject. 

The second method of stimulating interest in a subject is to 
employ suspense and thereby to appeal to curiosity. The 
method is seen in its simplicity, and at the same Useo f 
time in its most effective form, in the common Suspense, 
device of the interrupted narrative. The teacher develops the 
subject in story form up to a point of absorbing interest. Then 
he suddenly breaks off and leaves to the student the task of 



324 THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE ASSIGNMENT 

writing the conclusion. Similar effects may be secured in other 
ways. The teacher may give to a subject the interest of a puzzle 
or a paradox by discovering in it contradictory aspects which 
need to be reconciled, or by revealing phases of the subject 
which the student has not suspected, or by suggesting some 
novel method of treating it. An alert and enthusiastic teacher 
will delight in exercising his ingenuity to find new devices for 
creating suspense. By this means many old and hackneyed 
subjects may be given a new lease of life. 

Turning abstractions into concrete images is a third method 
of creating interest. For this purpose the teacher should use 
Appeal to the illustrations, examples, allusions, and other similar 
imagination. d ev j ces f or appealing to the imagination. Actual 
pictures will in many cases work wonders in making the dry 
bones live. 

Fourthly and finally, a powerful stimulus may be supplied by 
the teacher's own sympathy and enthusiasm. The teacher's 
The Teacher's interest w ^ kindle a like interest in the class ; no 
Sympathy. student can resist it. It is essential, however, that 
the emotion should be genuine ; interest pumped up for the 
occasion will leave the students cold. Another caution may be 
given at this point : the wise teacher will not say that a given 
subject is interesting, or tell the pupil that he ought to be inter- 
ested in it. Still less will he upbraid the class, or any individual 
member of it, for lack of enthusiasm. Without mentioning the 
word " interest," the teacher will by his manner and his mode of 
speech make the class realize the attraction that the subject has 
for him, and arouse in them, through the influence of sympathy, 
a feeling similar to his own. 

(3) It is not sufficient, however, for the teacher merely to 

arouse interest in the subject ; he should also arouse a desire to 

write upon it. Such a desire, when it is natural, 
Arousal of . , , , . . , . . 

the Desire springs from two healthy impulses : the impulse to 

give expression to one's thoughts and feelings, and 

the impulse to communicate one's thoughts and feelings to 

others. Both of these motive powers should be utilized to the 



THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE ASSIGNMENT 325 

full. Being complementary, each may be stimulated by giving 
exercise to the other. Thus, in order to cultivate the impulse 
to expression, it is sufficient to reveal the need of communica- 
tion. To cultivate the impulse to communication, it is suffi- 
cient to reveal the value of expression. If, for example, we 
wish to stir in any person a longing to express himself, we can 
do so most effectually by showing him that others are interested 
in what he will say. The sight of eager faces, the conscious- 
ness of waiting auditors, — these are the most powerful of all 
stimuli to expression. Conversely, the impulse to communica- 
tion may be set going by making the writer or speaker realize 
the value to others of the information he is prepared to impart. 
To call out and utilize these two impulses, the student should 
be made to feel that he is a member of the little community 
embraced within the family and the school. What he has to 
say is of some value to the other members of this community. 
He has his part to play in furnishing them with information or 
amusement or criticism. This means that in assigning the work 
the teacher should be at some pains to provide an audience or 
a reader. Sometimes the audience will be real, sometimes it 
will be imaginary, but it should never be entirely lacking. 

(4) It is appropriate and desirable, particularly in the earlier 
years, that the teacher should assist the student in blocking out 
his work. He may, if he chooses, suggest more or suggestion 
less definitely a method of analysis, an order of ofMetllod - 
topics and a mode of beginning and concluding. He may even 
go farther. The appropriate length of the composition, the 
due proportion of the parts to the whole, the method of devel- 
opment, the adaptation of matter and manner to the needs of 
the readers, — all these things may be spoken of in the assign- 
ment, though the extent to which they are introduced and the 
emphasis to be thrown upon them are matters to be decided ad 
hoc in individual cases. In general it may be said that this part 
of the assignment should be rather of the nature of hints and 
suggestions than of positive injunctions. Here, at any rate, is 
no place for formal rules of rhetoric. If in this portion of the 



326 THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE ASSIGNMENT 

assignment rhetorical principles are cited at all, they should be 

brought in by way of implication rather than by direct statement. 1 

(5) Finally, since prevention is better than cure, it is well to 

devote a portion of the assignment to prophylaxis ; i. <?., the 

teacher may at the close caution the student against 

prevailing errors and endeavour to forestall possible 

misconceptions. Such cautions, however, should not be thrown 

out at random ; they should be aimed at the besetting sins of 

the class in hand or at the temptations peculiar to the subject 

The faults of individuals should receive individual attention. 

In any case, this negative feature should be touched with a light 

and rapid hand. To close the assignment with a lecture on the 

errors of preceding essays is to destroy to some degree its 

dynamic effect. 

To sum up. The assignment is a talk — generally a brief 
talk — given by the teacher to the composition class. Its pur- 
pose is to throw the student into the proper mood 
or frame of mind for composing to the best advan- 
tage. This it does by providing him with an interesting subject 
to write about, by making him feel that he is capable of writing 
about it, by showing to him that other persons want him to write 
about it, and by giving him some intimation of the best method 
of attacking it. It may also include cautions against miscon- 
ception or error. The effect of the whole should be to create a 
natural situation, real or imaginary, in which the student's powers 
of expression and communication are stimulated to their normal 
maximum. 



1 This remark, however, applies more particularly to the lower grades ; 
in more advanced classes there is no reason why a rhetorical principle 
should not now and then be explicitly stated in the assignment. 



CHAPTER VII 

ESSAY-CORRECTING 
BIBLIOGRAPHY 

H. G. Buehler. On Correcting Compositions. Educational Review, 
VII. 492. 

P. Chubb. The Teaching of English in the Elementary and the Sec- 
ondary School. Macmillan. 1902. See references s. v. Correction in 
the Index. 

C. T. Copeland and H. M. Rideout. Freshman English and Theme- 
Correcting in Harvard College. Silver, Burdett & Co. 1901. 

B. A. Hinsdale. Teaching the Language-Arts : Speech, Reading, Com- 
position. Appleton. 1896. Chapter XVIII. 

W. H. Maxwell. An Experiment in Correcting Compositions. Educa- 
tional Review, VII. 240. 

Jules Payot. A suggestive series of papers in the Revue Universi- 
taire for July, 1897, and January, February, and April, 1898. 

A. Salles. De la Composition francaise. Revue Universitaire for 
December, 1895. 

S. Thurber. The Correction of School Compositions. The [Syra- 
cuse] Academy, VI. 254. 

The opinion that the correcting of school compositions is a 

low and disagreeable form of mental labour has been expressed 

so often and with so much emphasis and by so _ 

r J Theme- 

many eminent authorities that it has now come to Correcting 

in Ill-Repute, 
be regarded as a part of the condensed wisdom of 

humanity. Persons who do not profess to know anything else 

about the teaching of English, know that much, and cannot be 

shaken in their conviction. The teacher of composition who 

appears upon the street* or the campus with a bundle of essays 

under his arm is greeted by his friends with pitying smiles and 

expressions of sympathy. If he ventures to demur, as he 

sometimes does, and to affirm that he is still an optimist and on 

the whole rather enjoys this kind of work, the look of pity 



328 ESSA Y-CORRECTING 

slowly changes to one of rapt astonishment, to be succeeded 
in turn by shouts of laughter. He must be joking. That any 
one should actually derive pleasure from the correction of school 
compositions is too much for human credulity. 

For this general sentiment regarding the disagreeableness 
of theme-correcting there is doubtless a basis of fact. It must 
Is the Evil be conceded at once that to particular persons, 
Intrinsic? j n particular schools, on particular occasions, the 
work of correction is unrelieved drudgery. But the question 
which it is desired to raise in this discussion is not particular, but 
general. What we wish to inquire is whether or not correcting 
is, with some happy exceptions, inevitably joyless, — joyless 
intrinsically and universally. There is at least a possibility that 
the disagreeableness of which complaint is made is due not to 
an inherent and inseparable quality of the act, but to some 
accidental quality, — to some accompaniment or set of un- 
favourable conditions under which the act has hitherto been 
performed. We know that this may be the case in other 
branches of study. Let us take, for example, the case of 
a teacher of Virgil. Under favourable conditions, the teaching 
of the poetry of Virgil is regarded by students of Latin as a 
fairly agreeable task, interesting and enjoyable to teacher and 
pupil alike. But in particular cases the conditions may not be 
favourable. Suppose the case of a teacher who is compelled 
to teach Virgil eight hours a day for .six days in the week. 
Suppose also that he has Virgil conferences which take up the 
remainder of his working hours and even encroach on his 
sleep. Who, under these conditions, would not sicken of the 
sEfieid? Or take the case of a teacher who, having prepared 
himself for the teaching of Latin, is called upon to teach some- 
thing of a wholly different character, — let us say, geometry. 
Although he knows little about geometry, we may suppose, and 
cares nothing about its pedagogical aspects, — perhaps seriously 
misapprehends the end and aim of the science, — he is yet 
compelled to teach it to his classes four hours a day for five 
days in the week. Conceive how, longing all the time to be 



ESSAY-CORRECTING 329 

at his Latin, such a teacher would comport himself toward the 
teaching of geometry. 

Yet it not unfrequently occurs that the correcting of essays 
is performed under conditions not less unfavourable than those 
hinted at in the illustrations given above. It is unfavourable 
not uncommon for teachers of English in second- Conditions, 
ary schools who are conducting twenty hours of recitation a 
week, to sit up until twelve o'clock night after night in order to 
correct the compositions of their pupils, and to give liberally 
of their time after school hours to personal conferences. And 
cases are not unknown where the teacher of composition longs 
eagerly in his secret heart to teach some other subject — 
literature, perhaps. 1 Is it any wonder that the task is in such 
cases uncongenial? If these untoward conditions were re- 
moved, is it not conceivable that the correcting of essays might 
be found intrinsically as attractive as the teaching of Virgil or 
of geometry ? Examining these unfavourable conditions, let us 
attempt to determine whether or not they can be ameliorated. 
They are, as implied in the illustrations, as follows : — 

(1) The amount of correction is often greater than the 
teacher should be asked to undertake. 

(2) The work of correction is sometimes undertaken by 
persons who have no special aptitude for it. 

(3) The work of correction is sometimes undertaken by 
persons who have had no special training for it. And as a 
corollary from this, 

(4) The work of correction is sometimes undertaken by 
persons who misapprehend its purpose and essential charac- 
teristics. 

The first condition, namely, the excessive amount of correc- 
tion that teachers of English are asked to undertake, is doubt- 



1 " I have never done any rhetorical work at except in connection 

with my courses in literature, and I thank God I have been delivered 
from the bondage of theme-work into the glorious liberty of literature." 
From a private letter by a teacher in an Eastern University. 



3 30 ESS A Y-CORRECTING 

less the most unfavourable, and is responsible for most of the 
complaint. It is also the most difficult to remedy. Three solu- 
Co-operative ti° ns °f tne problem may be considered. The first 
Correction. j s t0 distribute the essays to be corrected among 
teachers of other subjects. The teacher of Latin takes a bunch, 
the teacher of physics another bunch, the teacher of mathematics 
another, until perhaps a third of the number has been peddled 
out. The teacher of English takes the rest. This co-operative 
plan has seemed to some principals an easy method of solving 
the problem, and is now in practice in a considerable number 
of schools. The chief objections to the method are, (i) that 
it throws the important work of correction into the hands of 
persons who may have had no preparation for it and may have 
no liking for it ; (2) that it divides responsibility for the method 
and degree of thoroughness of the correction, and by making it 
anybody's business ultimately makes it nobody's business ; and 
(3) that it prevents or delays the proper recognition of the 
special teacher of composition. 

These are theoretical considerations. Whether or not the 
method is pernicious in its practical application must be 
decided by an inspection of the schools in which it is in 
force. In several cases where it has been tried under the 
most favourable circumstances it has resulted in a rapid lower- 
ing of the standard of written English. 

A second solution was suggested .several years ago by 
Professor William Lyon Phelps, of Yale, in a brief article con- 
tributed to the Century Magazine. The nature 

anon of the suggestion will appear from the following 

corrigendo. 

extract : — 

" A wide reader is usually a correct writer ; and he has reached 
the goal in the most delightful manner, without feeling the 
penalty of Adam. . . . We would not take the extreme 
position taken by some, that all practice in theme-writing is 
time thrown away ; but after a costly experience of the drudgery 
that composition work forces on teacher and pupil, we would 
say emphatically that there is no educational method at present 
that involves so enormous an outlay of time, energy, and money, 



ESS A Y-CORRECTING 3 3 1 

with so correspondingly small a result. ... In order to support 
this with evidence, let us take the experience of a specialist 
who investigated the question by reading many hundred soph- 
omore compositions in two of our leading colleges, where the 
natural capacity and previous training of the students were 
fairly equal. In one college every freshman wrote themes 
steadily through the year, with an accompaniment of sound 
instruction in rhetorical principles ; in the other college every 
freshman studied Shakspere, with absolutely no training in 
rhetoric and with no practice in composition. A comparison 
of the themes written in their sophomore year by these students 
showed that technically the two were fully on a par. That is 
weighty and most significant testimony." 1 

Could the theory of the above citation be established as 
sound, a delightful simplification of the composition work would 
at once ensue. Composition classes could be disbanded. 
Readers of themes would drop their pencils and become readers 
of Shakspere. The raw student could be left to absorb from 
his Addison, his Macaulay, and his Stevenson, with scarce an 
effort, the proficiency in writing which his predecessors had 
won, so to speak, at the point of the bayonet. Unfortunately, 
however, the data for settling the question are not yet at hand. 
It is dangerous to generalize from a single instance, even when 
the utmost precautions have been taken to insure scientific 
accuracy. In this case no precautions appear to have been 
taken. Consequently it is an open question whether the results 
obtained were not due to wholly different causes from those 
assumed in the article. 2 



i Century Magazine, LI. 793, 794. 

2 In order to throw some light upon the problem, or at least to obtain 
opinions as to how light might be thrown upon it, the pedagogical section 
of the Modern Language Association of America issued in 1901 a circu- 
lar letter addressed to a large number of teachers of English in this 
country and abroad, containing the extract cited above. To the extract 
were appended the following questions : — 

1. What is your opinion of the idea expressed in the quotation ? 
2. Do you know of any similar experiments ? If so, please give full 
details. 3. Do you think it is possible to conduct an experiment or a 



332 ESSAY-CORRECTING 

The third solution of the problem is to increase the number 
of teachers. If themes must be read, let the schools furnish 
More Teachers tne men anc ^ women to read them. Double the 
Weeded. force ; if necessary, triple or quadruple it. If in a 

high school in which there are four hundred pupils, ten readers 
are necessary to handle all of the written work, then have ten 
readers. To this the objection will be raised that the tax- 
payers will not, and in many cases cannot, afford to pay the addi- 
tional expense required. But this objection can easily be set 
aside by an appeal to the history of education. Past experience 
shows that the general public has never shrunk from lavish ex- 
penditure upon the schools as soon as it was convinced of the 
necessity. Not many years ago, physics and chemistry were 
taught in our high schools at little greater expense than Latin 
and Greek. The laboratory method was almost unknown. Now 
even the smallest high school has its laboratory, equipped with 
expensive apparatus, while the equipment of the larger high 
schools for botany, zoology, physics, and chemistry fairly puts 
the universities to shame. It is not unusual for large high 
schools to spend eight, ten, even twenty thousand dollars 
in a lump, for means of instruction in science. This being so, 
surely it is not wholly past belief that if a concerted attempt 
were made to arouse public opinion upon the subject of English 
composition, the money could be obtained for doubling or 
quadrupling the force of teachers. 

Whether this happy state will ever be attained or not, of one 
thing we may be sure. It is that up to the present time too 



series of experiments which would furnish conclusive proof of the value 
or the futility of requiring freshmen to write themes steadily through 
the year ? 

A few of the most suggestive answers were embodied by Professor 
W. E. Mead, the Secretary of the Pedagogical Section, in a report pub- 
lished in the School Review for May, 1902, under the title " The 
Undergraduate Study of English Composition." As will appear from 
the specimens there given, opinion was fairly divided, though the burden 
of proof, as Professor Mead says, still rests upon the advocates of read- 
ing as against theme-writing and theme-correcting. 



ESS A Y-CORRECTING 333 

little credit has been given to the teacher of English for the 
composition work actually done in the schools, and conse- 
quently not enough allowance has been made for 
the time that must be devoted to this kind of work. Teachers 
If the correction of essays be taken into account, the 
teacher of English frequently does two or three times as much 
work as any other teacher in the school. Indeed, this is so 
well known that it is sometimes a matter of common jest among 
the teaching force. . It should be said for the teachers of Eng- 
lish that they take these jests in good part, and assume the 
extra burden in a spirit of self-sacrifice that is in the highest 
degree commendable. But this sacrifice should not be asked 
of them. The burdens of teaching should as soon as possible 
be adjusted more equitably. It is not unduly magnifying the 
importance of the English work to say that in any school when 
the time comes for an enlargement of the teaching force the 
first question asked should be, not " Do we need another teacher 
of science, or of history, or of mathematics ? " but " Do we not 
greatly need another teacher of English?" This should come 
first ; other questions later. 

The second unfavourable condition, namely, that the work of 
correction falls to the lot of persons who have no special apti- 
tude for it, may be dismissed somewhat briefly. 

J . Special 

Elsewhere in this book, the point has been made Aptitude 
. . . . , - ... Necessary, 

that special aptitude for essay-correcting is a sine 

qua non for a successful teacher of composition. Yet, in taking 
stock of the candidate's qualifications, it is commonly disre- 
garded. The assumption often seems to be that anybody who 
can read and write the English language with a fair degree of 
proficiency may be entrusted with the correction of composi- 
tions. In one sense this is perhaps true. Everybody, or almost 
everybody, can correct mistakes in spelling or can caution the 
pupil against certain well-known errors of speech, though even 
in this limited field some grotesque misconceptions might be 
noted ; but, as will be argued presently, this is not the essential 
part of essay-correction. Special aptitude, native talent for 



334 ESS A Y-CORRECTING 

this kind of work, genuine liking for it in all its phases, is 
probably as rare as a gift for mathematics, for the classics, or 
for the biological sciences. Any one, therefore, who purposes 
to undertake the teaching of English composition ought to ask 
himself seriously whether he has a special aptitude for correct- 
ing essays. Should he decide that in his case such aptitude is 
lacking, it does not follow that he should forthwith give up all 
thought of teaching composition, for he may be mistaken in his 
judgment of himself; but he should understand at the outset 
that in the struggle for existence he is seriously handicapped, 
and that he may be displaced, or at least outstripped, at any 
time by some one who through natural endowment is better 
fitted to survive. He should also understand that a kind of 
work which is distasteful to him is not likely to be either very 
attractive or very profitable to those who are so unfortunate as 
to be in his classes. 

In the third place, it sometimes occurs that the teacher who 
has a moderate number of essays to correct and also has special 
aptitude for correcting them, seriously misapprehends the nature 
of the task. To make this point clear it is necessary to speak 
at a little length of the purpose of composition and the part that 
correction plays in it. 

What is the object of composition work in the schools? 
Most teachers would reply to this question that it is to develop 

the student's facility in the use'of language. In one 
The Object of . J 7 

Composition sense this is true, but the answer may, and frequently 
Teaching. . J ^ 3 

does in practice, conceal a serious fallacy. The 

teacher of composition who does no more than to cultivate in 
his students a facility of speech has overlooked the main point. 
His first and most important duty is to develop character, to 
bring out in the boy or girl the man or woman that is to be, to 
fit the student for the part that he is to play in life. To this end 
instruction in English, as in any other subject, is but a means. 
We may, then, answer the question that stands at the beginning 
of the paragraph in some such way as this. The object of 
composition teaching is to fit the student to play his part in the 



ESSA Y-CORRECTING 335 

business of life so far as his use of language is concerned ; or, 
otherwise put, to enable him in any calling, as politics, religion, 
science, medicine, literature, to use the tool language in the 
most effective way.. 

This sounds, perhaps, like quibbling, but it is not. The dis- 
tinction is important and vital and far-reaching. The doctrine 
so sharply rebuked by Socrates in the Gorgias — the character 
doctrine, namely, that facility of pen and voice comes Facility of 
first in degree of importance, manhood and woman- s * eech * 
hood second — unfortunately did not perish with the Greek 
sophists. It still lives and exerts a powerful influence in our 
courts, our political gatherings, our newspapers, and our legisla- 
tures. It is the business of the teacher of composition to kill it 
at the root. If he does this, his work is so far good, though his 
students break every rule in English grammar. And if he does 
not do this, though he teach his pupils to speak with the tongues 
of men and of angels, his work is so far a failure. 

To fit the student to employ his tongue and his pen in the 
service of his manhood, the teacher may employ a variety of 
agencies. First, he may use the potent influence of jgj^j^g f 
good literature. Second, he may give the student Correction, 
practice in writing and speaking. Third, he may instruct the 
student in the principles of rhetoric ; that is, he may call his at- 
tention to the uniformities of expression observable in the 
composition of successful writers. Fourth, — and this is the 
point in which we are now especially interested, — he may take 
note wherein the student's powers and habits of expression are 
susceptible of improvement, and by words of encouragement, ad- 
vice, caution, or censure, as the case requires, may help him to 
overcome his faults. It is this last procedure to which the term 
"correction" is applied. Under this head should be brought not 
only abbreviations, hints, and questions written in the margin of 
the essay, but also counsel and suggestion given to the student 
orally. 

Taking correction in this broad sense, we may say that its 
purpose, like that of composition teaching in general, is the 



33^ ESS A Y-CORRECTING 

development of the individual student with respect to his use 
of language. Its specific aim is the checking of bad habits 
Aim f of expression and communication and the substitu- 

Correction. tion for them of good h abits> I nasmuc h as all who 

learn to write commit errors of one kind or another, correction 
is an indispensable part of the teaching of composition. 

Regarding correction from the point of view indicated above, 
we may next inquire into its proper nature and spirit. From 
what has just been said, we may infer certain general character- 
istics, as follows : — 

(i) Correction should be individual. Study of the individual 
student, the proper starting-point for all teaching of composition, 
is peculiarly necessary as a basis for correction, 
individual The good teacher of English will try to know his 
students through and through. Informing himself 
in every possible way regarding the influences that have shaped 
their speech thus far and have given it its individuality, he will 
be interested in learning their present habits of mind, — their 
ambitions, their doubts, their fancies, their likes and dislikes. 
By careful inquiry and observation, and perhaps by experiment, 
he will try to determine each student's failings and the causes of 
them, so that when occasion arises he can lay his finger upon the 
point of weakness and say with confidence, " Here and here 
thou ailest." But he will endeavour also to learn wherein lies 
the strength of each student, and to this quest he will devote not 
less attention than to the discovery of his failings. 

(2) Correction should be constructive. This is a corollary 
from the* definition. Correction, like every other part of com- 
Correction position work, should primarily aim at develop- 
Deveiop, not ment. It should build up, not tear down. It has, 
Repress. t0 ^ Q sure> a ne g a tive side, which must not be left 

out of the account. Thus, if its immediate object is to check 
and repress a wrong tendency, it may take the form of rebuke. 
Sometimes the only way to unseal the eyes of a pupil who is in 
love with his own faults is by means of irony. But correction 
should not stop with these negative results. Its ultimate aim 



ESS A Y-CORRECTING 337 

should be the development, not the repression, of the student's 
powers. 

To be truly constructive, correction should be stimulating and 
suggestive. It should stir the pupil's thought, give him some- 
thing definite to reflect upon, set a problem for him to solve. 
Paradoxical as it may seem, good correction will promote origi- 
nality and spontaneity. It will widen the pupil's intellectual 
horizon and rouse his dormant faculties. It will remind him of 
knowledge already acquired, pique his curiosity, and stir his 
ambition to acquire fresh knowledge. There are a hundred 
ways in which this end can be attained. To take a single illus- 
tration, the alert teacher will often make use of apt reference to 
literature. By this means a commonplace correction can often 
be reanimated. For example, suppose the word " transpire " to 
have been wrongly used in the sense of " happen." Correction of 
the error may be made in two different ways. The unsugges- 
tive way is to put an abbreviation or question-mark in the 
margin. A suggestive and thought-provoking way is to write 
there : " See Lowell's Letters, Vol. II. p. 47." The student on 
turning to the citation reads as follows : — 

TO T. B. ALDRICH. 

My dear Aldrtch : — It is a capital little book — but I had 
read it all before, and liked it thoroughly. I think it is whole- 
some, interesting, and above all natural. The only quarrel I 
have with you is that I found in it the infamous word " tran- 
spired." E-pluribus-unum it ! Why not " happened " ? You 
are on the very brink of the pit. 

By a reference of this kind not only is the student's attention 
so fixed upon the error that he is not likely to forget it, but by 
the very process of correction he is introduced to an entertain- 
ing collection of letters which some day he may wish to read. 
The teacher of composition should have in his mind, or at his 
elbow in a card catalogue, hundreds of such references, cover- 
ing all cases of words commonly misused by his students. Is he 
fond of Shakspere ? What task could be more pleasant than to 

22 



338 ESS A Y-CORRECTING 

collect from Shakspere's writings striking examples of such 
words? Does he wish his pupils to read Tennyson and to 
commit to memory extracts from his poems ? How better ac- 
complish this end than by sending them to the poems to note 
Tennyson's use of common words? So with the larger ele- 
ments of discourse. If the pupil's description is weak or in 
bad taste, direct him to something on the same subject in Haw- 
thorne, in Irving, or in Defoe. Such reading as this comes 
home to the pupil, sticks in his memory, and gradually forms 
within his mind a standard for self-criticism. 

It should be superfluous to add that all constructive correc- 
tion is given in a kindly and helpful spirit. This means that 

the teacher must not only have a general interest in 
spirit ' the welfare of the student, but a close sympathy 

with his aims, his struggles, his failures, and his small 
successes. It is not by any means necessary, as some teachers 
seem to think, that this sympathy should be sentimental and 
gushing. It may, on the contrary, find expression in words that 
are sharp and caustic, provided only there is about them that 
indefinable something which assures the student that in his 
teacher he has a guide, philosopher, and friend. 

(3) In the third place, correctio?i should be rational. This 
means that the teacher of composition should have not only 

sympathy and good taste, but also knowledge. He 
should toe should be so thoroughly grounded in the underlying 

principles of rhetoric that whenever need arises he 
can give a reason, where a reason is possible, for the faith that 
is within him. In this regard teachers of composition are not 
as a body so well informed as is desirable. It is doubtful 
whether any great number of teachers even in the universities 
have kept track of the advance of rhetorical theory, are prepared, 
for instance, to say just what additions to the knowledge of 
rhetorical effects have been made by recent investigations in 
psychology, ethics, sociology, and sesthetics. For this they 
are not wholly to blame. Unlike teachers of physics, of modern 
languages, of biology, and of other studies that could be named, 



ESS A Y-CORRECTING 339 

teachers of rhetoric have as yet no technical journal in which by 
the recording of investigation and the exchange of opinion the 
chaff can be separated from the wheat. Much, however, can 
be gained from books. Teachers ought at least to push their, 
studies far enough to distinguish between slipshod work like that 
of Richard Grant White, in certain of his writings, and the 
editor of the Verbalist, and scientific work like that of Paul and 
Kellner and Jespersen. They should be sufficiently enlightened 
not to assume before the dictionary the attitude of the savage 
in the presence of his fetich. The time is coming when every 
teacher of rhetoric and composition will be expected to know 
something about the history of rhetorical theory and the present 
status of unsettled problems. Lacking such knowledge, the 
teacher in his correction is apt to be arbitrary, inconsistent, and 
hypercritical. 

(4) In the fourth place, correction should be systematic. The 
teacher may advisedly put himself in the attitude of the physi- 
cian. Having diagnosed the case of a pupil who Value of 
comes under his charge, he should lay out the course System. 

of treatment and forecast the outcome. Such correction as is 
made should then be made with reference to this end. It is an 
excellent plan to keep such a brief record of the pupil's case as 
physicians are wont to keep of their patients, noting therein the 
results of the correction. If the pupil's rhetorical health does 
not improve under treatment, a systematic effort should be made 
to discover and to eradicate the cause of his disease. 

Unsystematic correction is not only futile in a majority of 
cases ; it also wastes the teacher's time. Not every fault in 
every essay needs to be corrected. It is sometimes best to 
concentrate attention for a time upon one or two essentials. 
Not infrequently in the case of work which is manifestly crude 
and defective the most helpful correction which the teacher can 
give is to write at the end of the composition, " Good ! keep 
at it." 

(5 ) Last, and most important of all, the teacher in his cor- 
rection should exercise commo?i sense. This is the saving grace, 



340 ESSA Y-CORRRCTING 

the crowning virtue in every department of instruction ; but it 
is of especial worth in the department of composition. Judi- 
ciously exercised, it will save the teacher from the 
of Common besetting sins of narrowness and dogmatism. It will 

SGHS 6 

also absolve him from the solemn reproach of know- 
ing too much about his subject. How any teacher can know 
too much about his own business is difficult to understand, but it 
may easily happen that a well-equipped teacher of composition 
will make a foolish use of his rhetorical learning, just as, if he 
were ignorant, he would make a foolish use of his ignorance. 
Says Mr. Balfour, in one of his entertaining addresses : " It is 
true, no doubt, that many learned people are dull ; but there is 
no indication whatever that they are dull because they are 
learned. True dulness is seldom acquired ; it is a natural grace, 
the manifestations of which, however modified by education, 
remain in substance the same. Fill a dull man to the brim with 
knowledge, and he will not become less dull, as the enthusiasts 
for education vainly imagine, but neither will he become duller." 
Speaking in the same spirit, we may say that although many 
learned teachers of rhetoric have been failures, there is slight 
evidence to prove that they failed because they were learned. 
All that was needed was the exercise of a little common sense. 
An endeavour has now been made to sketch in broad outlines 
the purpose and the essential characteristics of good correction. 
Correction It remains to inquire whether correction with such 
canyiS? 31 " an a ^ m an d of sucn a nature is inherently and in- 
agxeeable. evitably disagreeable. The opinion will here be 
stoutly maintained that it is not. On the contrary, pursued in 
the right way, the correction of essays may be. as pleasing and 
as profitable as any pedagogical procedure that can be men- 
tioned. Why is any kind or part of teaching attractive? 
Because, primarily, it gives an opportunity to exercise special 
aptitude and training for the benefit of society ; secondly, be- 
cause it enables the teacher to promote his scholarship, to cul- 
tivate his tastes, to build up his character, to broaden and deepen 
his views of things. Now the correction of essays, commonly 



ESS A Y-CORRECTING 34 1 

deemed so trivial, so burdensome, so wasteful of the mental 
energies, gives opportunity to him who knows how to seize it, 
for the attainment of all these ends. Has the teacher a native 
gift, a special aptitude for correction? Here is his supreme 
chance in life. Let him not throw it away. And it is no small 
gift. The power to help others in acquiring a mastery of their 
native speech is one of the most important and valuable in the 
whole circle of pedagogical equipment. 

Does the teacher desire to cultivate his scholarship ? The 
way is open. If his interest is in literature he may so shape his 
methods of correction that the ransacking of any 
given field of poetry or prose will be unescapable. Means to 
If he desires to pursue the study of psychology, he 
should know that the psychology of language processes is one 
of the most fascinating as well as one of the most profitable of 
modern lines of research in this field. If he is interested, as he 
ought to be, in the reconstruction now going on of the science 
of rhetoric, the opportunity is all that could be asked for. The 
written work of the pupils in the secondary schools constitutes 
precisely the material needed for investigation in this subject. 

Finally, that correction carried on in the manner and spirit 
here indicated is a cultivating, liberalising, and character- 
building process, need not be argued at length. It 

Correction 
is surely not going too far to say that a kind of may be a Joy 

forever. 
teaching which brings the instructor into so vital and 

intimate relations with his pupils, which calls for so great an 
exercise of sympathy, insight, and moral influence, can compete 
in these respects with other departments of instruction. 

We may then briefly draw the conclusion that essay-correct- 
ing, when there is not too much of it, when one has special 
aptitude and training for it, when its true purpose and essential 
character are understood, is not intrinsically disagreeable. It 
may in a true sense become a joy forever. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 



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Proceedings of the North Central Association of Colleges and 

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Stoddard, F. H. School Review 6 : 223 Entrance Requirements in 
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Summary of the Proceedings of the Conference on Uniform Entrance 
Requirements in English, 1894-99. (Published by the Conference.) 



350 BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Van Slyck, F. G. N. School Review 9 : 316 Working Conditions in 
the High School with Regard to College Requirements in English. 



III. Rhetoric and Composition 
(See also IX. English in the Lower Grades.) 

Abbott, E. A. Macmillan's Magazine 18 : 33 The Teaching of English. 
Reprinted in Massachusetts Teacher 21 : 271. 

Adams, C. F. Nation 56:31 English at Harvard. 

Nation 61 : 309 School English. 

Adams, C. F., E. L. Godkin, and Geo. R. Nutter. Report of the Com- 
mittee on Composition and Rhetoric to the Board of Overseers of 
Harvard College. April, 1895. 

Report of the Committee on Composition and Rhetoric to the 

Board of Overseers of Harvard College. (Second Report.) 

Adams, C. F., E. L. Godkin, and Josiah Quincy. Report of the Com- 
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Harvard College. Published, in part, in Harvard Graduates' Mag- 
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Adams, C. F., and W. W. Goodwin. Harvard Graduates' Magazine 
1 : 177 Preparatory School Education. Pp. 178-189 The Classics 
and Written English, with facsimiles (C. F. Adams) ; pp. 189-193 
The Root of the Evil (W. W. Goodwin). Reviewed by Wm. 
S trunk, Jr., in School Review 1 : 127. 

Atkinson, J. H. Journal of Pedagogy 13: 122 English Composition. 

Atlantic Monthly 72 : 284 The English Question Again. 

Balch, S. W. Education 16 : 223 Rhetoric for Science. 

Baldwin, C. S. Educational Review 8 : 290 Value of the Office-Hour in 
the Teaching of Rhetoric. 

Barbour, F. A. School Review 6:500 English Composition in the 
High School. 

Beers, H. A. Educational Review 3 : 427 Entrance Requirements in 
English at Yale. 

Bouton, E. Education 5 : 91 Study of English. 

Briggs, L. B. R. New England Journal of Education 38 : 383 What 
the College Desires. 

Academy (Syracuse) 3:345 The Harvard Admission Examina- 
tion in English. Reprinted in Twenty Years of School and College 
English (Cambridge : 1896), pp. 17-32. 

Academy (Syracuse) 5 : 302 The Correction of Bad English as 

a Requirement for Harvard College. Reprinted in Twenty Years of 
School and College English (Cambridge: 1896), pp. 33-43. 

Browne, G. H. Educational Review 9 : 377 Educational Value of 
English. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 3 5 1 

Brownlee, J. H. Academy (Syracuse) 6 : 8o Study of English in 
Preparatory Schools and Colleges. 

Buck, Gertrude. Educational Review 22 : 197 What does Rhetoric 
Mean ? Review of an investigation into the graduate study of 
rhetoric, conducted by the Pedagogical Section of the Modern 
Language Association of America. 

Educational Review 22 : 371 Recent Tendencies in the Teaching 

of English Composition. 

Modern Language Notes 15:167 The Present Status of Rhetori- 
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Buehler, H. G. Educational Review 7 : 492 On Correcting Com- 
positions. Comments upon an article by Superintendent W. H. 
Maxwell in Educational Review 7 : 240. 

Burton, Richard. Dial 19 : 277 The Teaching of English and the 
Making of Writers. 

Carpenter, F. I. Dial 14:271 The Teaching of our Mother Tongue. 

Castor, T. H. Academy (Syracuse) 4 : 565 Instruction in Language. 

Clark, J. S. Academy (Syracuse) 4:369 English in Secondary 
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Clark, T. A. Papers Read at the Second Annual Session of the 
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Composition in the High Schools of Illinois. 

Collar, Geo., and Chas W. Crook. School Management and Methods 
of Instruction. London : 1900. Macmillan. Pp. 155-168. 

Collins, J. S. Academy (Syracuse) 5 : 367 Logic with Rhetoric. 

Copeland, C. T., and H. M. Rideout. Freshman English and Theme- 
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Coy, E. G., and others. Nation 63 : 344, 364, 385 English in Colleges 
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Cox, E. S. Addresses and Proceedings of the National Educational 
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Currie, James S. Common School Education. Edinburgh. Thomas 
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Daniel, M. L. Education 16:562 Concentration as Applied to the 
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Deahl, J. N. Imitation in Education : Its Nature, Scope, and Signifi- 
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De Quincey, Thos. The Education of Boys in Large Numbers. Works, 
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352 BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Dewey, John. The School and Society. Chicago : 1899. University 
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Easton, Wm. M. Publications of the Modern Language Association 
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Fisher, It. B. Academy (Syracuse) 4: 311 Teaching of English. 

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Goodwin, W. W. Nation 61 : 291 School English. 

Gore, Willard C. Dial 23:210 Scientific Wprk in Rhetoric. See 
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Greenough, J. J. Atlantic 71 1656 The English Question. 

Groce, Byron. Academy (Syracuse) 6 : 529 The Emphasis in the 
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Hales, J. W. Essays on a Liberal Education, Edited by F. W. Farrar. 
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Harlow, W. B. Academy (Syracuse) 4: 151 A Three Years' Course 
in English Composition. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 353 

Harrison, Caskie. Dial 17:286 The Work of Preparatory Schools 
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Herrick, Robert. Methods of Teaching Rhetoric. Chicago : 1898. 
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Hill, A. S. American Institute of Instruction 1884: no English in the 
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An Answer to the Cry for More English. In Twenty Years of School 

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Hill, A. S., and Eliza A. Witney. Educational Review 14:468, 15:55 
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Hill, A. S. Our English. New York: 1889. Pp. 1-71 English in 
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Huffcut, E. W. New England Journal of Education 24: 355, 386, 418 ; 
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Science 9 :474 English in the Preparatory School. 

Huling, Ray Greene. Proceedings of the National Educational Asso- 
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Hull, L. C. Michigan School Moderator 5:525, 545, 568 Essay Writ- 
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Hurlbut, B. S. Academy (Syracuse) 6 : 351 The Preparatory Work 
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44, 45- 

Jillson, W. E. Education 7 : 691 English in the Preparatory School. 

Jordan, Mary A. New England Journal of Education 55 : 361 Some 
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Havana, Rose M. Dial 31 : 353 Some Recent Phases of English 
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School Review 10 : 298 The Constructive Side of English Study. 

Keeler, Harriet A. Academy (Syracuse) 1:58 A Schedule of Com- 
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Kellogg, B. School Review 1 :96, 152 On Teaching English. 

Keyser, R. S. Academy (Syracuse) 5 = 361 Question of English. 

School Review 1 : 131 Readjustment of the School Curriculum. 

Knowlton, Stephen B. School Review 4 : 682 The Recitation in the 
Study of English. 

Lambert, W. H. American Institute of Instruction 1888 : 54 English 
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Lockwood, Sarah E. H. Academy (Syracuse) 4:255 English in Sec- 
ondary Schools. 

23 



354 BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Lowell, D. O. S. School Review 10 : 351 The Teaching of English in 
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Lowry, C. Journal of Education (London) 11:334 Teaching of 
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M'Chesney, J. B. Addresses and Proceedings of the National Educa- 
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Macdonald, S. W. Harvard Graduates' Magazine 2 : 258 Defective 
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McElroy, J. G. R. Academy (Syracuse) 4: 244 English in Secondary 
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Manny, P. A. Papers Read at the Second Annual Session of the Uni- 
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School and Home Education 20 : 21 A Method of Teaching 

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School Review 10:317 The Undergraduate Study of English 
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Meader, Emily Isabel. School Review 7 1472 A High School Course 
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New York Evening Post, October 13, 1896 The Growing Illiteracy 
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Nightingale, A. F. Addresses and Proceedings of the National Educa- 
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BIBLIOGRAPHY 355 

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356 BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Thurber, C. H. School Review 6 : 328 English as it is Taught. 

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Education 14 : 193 The Limitations of the Secondary Teaching of 

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New England Journal of Education 36 : 74 The Three Parts of 

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IV. Literature 
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Hanna, John C. Addresses and Proceedings of the National Educa- 
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360 BIBLIOGRAPHY 

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Johnson, Charles P. American Institute of Instruction 1892 : 174 
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McMurry, Charles A. Addresses and Proceedings of the National 



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Addresses and Proceedings of the National Educational Association 

1896: 95 American Literature. 

Maxcy, Carroll Lewis. School Review 1 : 105 Teaching Shakespeare. 

Maxwell, Wm. H. New England Journal of Education 29: 150 Crit- 
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Meader, Emily Isabel. School Review 7 : 472 A High School Course 
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Mead, Wm. E. Academy (Syracuse) 2 : 49 A Ten Years' Course in 
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Monroe, Will S. New England Journal of Education 29 : 213 Teaching 
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Morton, E. P. Modern Language Notes 15 : 192 A Method of Teach- 
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Moulton, Richard G-. Addresses and Proceedings of the National Edu- 
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New York Teachers' Monographs, IV. 2 (June, 1902) Reading and 
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Pall Mall Gazette Extra, No. 32, January 20, 1887 English Literature 
and How to Study It. Letters from Gladstone, Morley, Huxley, 
Froude, Arnold, Jowett and others on the study of English Liter- 
ature at the Universities. 

Pancoast, H. S. Lippincott's Magazine 66 : 434 The Reading of 
Children. 

Peaslee, John B. Education 2:150 Moral and Literary Training in 
Public Schools. 

— — Thoughts and Experiences. Cincinnati : 1900. Curts and Jen- 
nings. Pp. 33, 40-67, 72-76, 80-100. 

Porter, Charlotte, and Clarke, Helen A. Poet-Lore 8 : 432, 9 : 585 New 
Ideas in Teaching English Literature, with suggestions for their 
' application to required English. 



362 BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Price, Thos. R. Publications of the Modern Language Association, 
New Series, Vol. IX. p. 77 The New Function of Modern Lan- 
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Proceedings of the First Annual Convention of the Association of 
Colleges and Preparatory Schools of the Middle States and Mary- 
land. 1893. Pp. 78-108. 

Reports of the United States Commissioner of Education 1889-90, II. : 
1 168 Reading and Literature. 

Rolfe, Wm. J. American Institute of Instruction 1884 : I0 7 One 
Way of Studying Poetry in School. (Abstract.) 

Poet-Lore 6 : 592 The Poets in School. 

Ryland, Frederick. Journal of Education (London), New Series 
21 : 335 English Literature in Girls' Schools. 

Sawvel, Franklin B. Education 17 : 290 Aims in the Study of Litera- 
ture. 

Schelling, Felix E. University Magazine 1893 : 5 How can the High- 
est Educational Efficiency be secured for English in American 
Colleges. 

Scudder, Horace E. Addresses and Proceedings of the National 
Educational Association 1888: 57 The Place of Literature in 
Common-School Education. 

Atlantic Monthly 70 : 382 The Primer and Literature. 

Atlantic Monthly 73 : 252 The Educational Law of Reading and 

Writing. 

Sewell, Jas. W. School Review 8 : 80 English. 

Shepherd, H. E. Education 9:73, 178 Methods of Study in Eng- 
lish Literature. 

Sherman, L. A. Educational Review 10 : 42 English and English 
Literature in the College. 

Poet-Lore 6:381 Specialized Teaching of Literature; 8:567 

New Ideas in Teaching Literature. 

Shute, Katharine H. Journal of Pedagogy'n :266 The Value of 
Literature; 13:371 Ideals in Literature. 

Smith, George J. Educational Review 10 : 444 A High-School 
Course in English Literature and its Correlations. 

Smyth, A. H. Publications of the Modern Language Association of 
America, Vol. III. p. 238 American Literature in the Class-Room. 

Sprague, Homer B. Addresses and Proceedings of the National Edu- 
cational Association 1887 : 448 The Place of Literature in the 
College Course. 

Spring, Leverett W. Education 13:83 Teaching English Literature. 

Stark, A. B. Education 2 : 492 Teaching English. 

Super, Charles W. Journal of Pedagogy 11:316 Some Thoughts on 
Fiction as a Factor in Education. 

Tappan, Eva March. Journal of Pedagogy 12 :40 How to make the 
Most of the Course in English in Secondary Schools. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 363 

Thurber, Samuel. Academy (Syracuse) 4 : 165 The Annotation of Eng- 
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485 English Literature in the Schools. 

Education 16:449 Aims and Methods in the Study of Literature. 

New England Journal of Education 36:74 The Three Parts of 

English Study. 

School Review 2:321 English Literature in Girls' Education: 

6:483 How to Make the Study of Literature Interesting; 8:129 
An Address to Normal Teachers of English. 

Tovey, D. C. Reviews and Essays in English Literature. London: 
1897. Bell. Pp. 1-21 The Teaching of English Literature. 

Trent, W. P. Addresses and Proceedings of the National Educational 
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with Special Reference to Secondary Schools. See also New 
England Journal of Education 44 : 94. 

Atlantic Monthly 78:414 Teaching the Spirit of Literature. 

Triggs, O. L. Poet-Lore 6 : 389 Personality in Teaching Literature ; 
8 : 452 New Ideas in Teaching Literature. 

Underwood, Francis H. Addresses and Proceedings of the National 
Educational Association 1872: 159 English Literature and its 
Place in Popular Education. Same article in Massachusetts 
Teacher 25 : 186, 412. 

"Warner, Charles Dudley. Atlantic Monthly 65 : 721 The Novel and 
the Common School. 

Webster, W. F. Addresses and Proceedings of the National Educa- 
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with a Defence of the Same. 

Wells, J. Educational Review 6:277 The Teaching of English Lit- 
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Wetherbee, Emily G. American Institute of Instruction 1886 : 147 
The Study of English Literature. 

White, T. W. Education 12 : 273 Claims for English Literature as a 
Study. 

Wilkins, A. S. Journal of Education (London), New Series 16 : 263 
Teaching of Literature in Schools. 

Williams, A. M. Educational Times 46:319 On Teaching English 
Literature. 

Winship, A. E. New England Journal of Education 19 : 52 The 
Study of English Literature. 

Wright, Charles B. Academy (Syracuse) 5 : 467 What the College has 
a Right to Expect in English from the High School. 

Zimmern, Alice. Journal of Education (London), New Series 22 : 557 
Literature as a Central Subject. 



364 BIBLIOGRAPHY 

V. Grammar 
(See also IX. English in the Lower Grades.) 

Allen, Edward A. Education 7 : 460 English Grammar, Viewed from 

All Sides. 
Bain, Alexander. Education as a Science. New York : 1879. Ap- 

pleton. Pp. 166, 168, 210-213, 312-349. 
Barnett, P. A. Common Sense in Education and Teaching. London, 

New York, and Bombay : 1899. Longmans. Pp. 191-194. 
Blakiston, J. R. The Teacher. London : 1883. Macmillan. Pp. 48-51. 
Blodgett, J. H. Addresses and Proceedings of the National Educa- 
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Common Schools. 
Bowen, E. E. Essays on a Liberal Education. Edited by F. W. Farrar. 

London : 1868. Macmillan. Pp. 179-204. 
Bowen, H. Courthope. Educational Times 50 : 493 English as the 

Beginning of the Teaching of Language, with some Reference to 

Latin. 
Journal of Education (London), New Series 12:275 The Teach- 
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Brown, Geo. P. -School and Home Education 18 : 247 Language 

Lessons and Grammar. 
School and Home Education 19 : 243 Our Grammar School In- 
struction. 
Buck, Gertrude. School Review 5:472 The Psychology of the Dia- 

^gram. 
Education 18 : 269 The Psychological Significance of the Parts of 

Speech. 

Educational Review 13 : 250 The Sentence-Diagram. 

Chubb, Pereival. The Teaching of English in the Elementary and the 

Secondary School. New York : 1902. Macmillan. Chapter XII. 

Grammar and Language Work in the Grammar Grades. 
Collar, Geo., and Chas. W. Crook. School Management and Methods 

of Instruction. London : 1900. Macmillan. Pp. 134-155. 
Compayre, Gabriel. Lectures on Pedagogy. Translated by W. H. 

Payne. Boston : 1893. Pp- 325-338. 
Currie, James S. Common School Education. Edinburgh. Thomas 

Laurie. Pp. 348-365. 
Cutting, Starr W. Proceedings of the Modern Language Association 

of America, 1893: xix Should the Elementary Study of Grammar 

be chiefly Inductive ? 
Darling, Gertrude. Education 18 : 346 Syntax and Psychology. 
Davenport, H. J. Education 20: 161, 208 The Scope and Method of 

Grammar. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 365 

Davenport, H. J. School and Home Education 20 : 74 Technical 
Grammar. 

De Garmo, Charles. Public School Journal 9:473 Elementary Lan- 
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Emerson, O. F. School Review 5:129 The Teaching of English 
Grammar. 

Fitch, J. G. Lectures on Teaching. Cambridge: 1881. University 
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Fouillee, Alfred. Education from a National Standpoint. Translated 
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Pp. 228-232. 

Garlick, A. H. A New Manual of Method. New York : 1896. Long- 
mans. Pp. 277-302. 

Gildersleeve, Basil L. Essays and Studies. Baltimore : 1890. Murray. 
Pp. 127-157 Grammar and Aesthetics. 

Journal of Education (London), New Series 14: 59, 60; 22: 365 What 
is meant by " The Teaching of English in Public Schools " ? 

Lang, S. E. Educational Review 21:294 Modern Teaching of Gram- 
mar. 

Liddell, Mark H. Atlantic Monthly 82 : 98 English Historical 
Grammar. 

March, F. A. Addresses and Proceedings of the National Educational 
Association 1872 : 240 Methods of Teaching English in the High 
School. 

Newell, M. A. Addresses and Proceedings of the National Educational 
Association 1872 : 136 English Grammar in Elementary Schools. 

Owen, Lincoln. Education 21:585 Suggestions upon the Teaching 
of English Grammar in the Elementary Schools. v 

Parker, Francis "W. Talks om Teaching. New York: 1883. Kellogg. 
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Robinson, Robert. Teacher's Manual of Method and Organization. 
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Salmon, David. The Art of Teaching. London, New York and Bom- 
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Snoddy, James S. Education 19 : 522 English Grammar in Elementary 
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Sonnenschein, E. A. Educational Review 3 : 450 The Parallel Study 
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Spence, James. Journal of Education (London), New Series 6:292, 
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Swett, John. Methods of Teaching. New York : 1880. Harper. 
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Vietor, Wilhelm. Educational Review 6:351 A New Method of 
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White, Emerson E. The Elements of Pedagogy. Cincinnati and New 
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366 BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Whitney, W. D. New England Journal of Education 3:133,181,229 
The Study of English Grammar. 

Wilkinson, John W. Education 20 : 77 Common Mistakes in Teach- 
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Winch, Wm. H. Problems in Education. London: 1900. Sonnen- 
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Woodward, F. C. New England Journal of Education 29 : 324 " Eng- 
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VI. English Philology and the Study of Old 
English 

Barbour, F. A. Academy (Boston) 5 : 158 Anglo-Saxon in the High 

School. 
Collins, J. Churton. The Study of English Literature. London: 

1891. Macmillan. Pp. 56-70 Distinction between Literature and 

Philology. 
Earle, J. Forum 13 : 75 Study of English. 

Easton, Morton W. Academy ( Syracuse ) 4 : 489 Comparative Grammar. 
Garnett, J. M. Addresses and Proceedings of the National Educational 

Association 1876: 141 The Study of the Anglo-Saxon Language 

and Literature. 
Academy (Syracuse) 5 : 112 The Position of Old English in a 

General Education. 
Gummere, F. B. Publications of the Modern Language Association of 

America, Vol. I. p. 170 What place has Old English Philology in 

our Elementary Schools ? 
Hart, John S. Proceedings of the American Association for the Ad- 
vancement of Education. Session IV. Pp. 33-66 On the Study 

of the Anglo-Saxon Language. 
Journal of Education (London), New Series 11:19 Philology and 

Language Teaching. 
March, F. A. Method of Philological Study of the English Language. 

New York: 1865. Harper. 
Publications of the Modern Language Association of America, Vol. 

VIII. p. xix Recollections of Language Teaching. 
Schuyler, W. H. New England Journal of Education 7 : 36 The Study 

of Anglo-Saxon. 
Sears, L. American Institute of Instruction 1886: 76 The Study of 

Anglo-Saxon. 
Sweet, Henry. Journal of Education (London), New Series 8 : 148. 

The Teaching of Phonetics. 
Thurber, S. Academy (Syracuse) 5 : 513 Suggestions of English Study 

for Secondary Teaching of English. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 367 



VII. The Teaching of German Composition in 

Germany 

Apelt, Otto. Der deutsche Aufsatz in der Prima : Ein historischkriti- 
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Becker. Herrig's Archiv 14 (1853) : 36 Etwas liber den Zusammen- 
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Beschmarm, Dr. Herrig's Archiv 19 (1856) : 68 Ueber deutsche 
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Bindseil, Dr. Zur Methodik des deutschen Unterrichts in der Prima der 
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Bolton, F. E. . Secondary School System of Germany. New York : 
1900. Appleton. 

Buehner, W. Deutscher Unterricht in hoheren Madchenschulen. 
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Curricula and Programmes of Work for Higher Schools in Prussia, 
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Dale, F. H. The Teaching of the Mother Tongue in Germany. In 
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Doering, Dr. Ueber freie Redeiibungen in deutscher Sprache auf Gym- 
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Edel, Augusta. Our Study of our Mother Tongue in the Munich 
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Fischer, C. Der deutsche Sprachunterricht in den Schulen Deutschlands 
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Florin, A. Deutscher Unterricht in Lehrerseminaren. W. Rein's 
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Hiecke, R. H. Der deutsche Unterricht auf Deutschen Gymnasien. 
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Hildebrand, R Beitrage zum deutschen Unterricht. Leipzig: 1896. 

Vom deutschen Sprachunterricht in der Schule. 4te Aufl. Leip- 
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Imelmann, I. Vortrag iiber deutschen Unterricht in der 5. General- 
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368 BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Jeep, Chr. Ueber deutsche Lektiire und schriftliche Produktion in den 
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Jonas, A. Mittheilungen aus dem deutschen Unterricht in Prima. Pro- 
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Jones, Richard D. Education 15 144, 100 German Methods of Using 
the Mother Tongue. Also published in the Addresses and Proceed- 
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Kapp, A. Herrig's Archiv 12 (1853) : I Zur Forderung des deutschen 
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Kaufmann, G. Rhetorenschulen und Klosterschulen in Gallien wahrend 
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Kern, Frz. Zur Methodik des deutschen Unterrichts. Berlin : 1883. 

Klemm, L. R. European Schools. New York : 1891. Appleton. 

Krueger, Dr. Die Primaner-Arbeiten gegen Ende des 17. und im An- 
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Laas, Ernst. Der deutsche Aufsatz in der oberen Gymnasialklassen. 
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Der deutsche Unterricht auf hoheren Lehranstalten. Ein kritisch- 

organisatorischer Versuch. Berlin : 1872. 

Lehmann, R. Deutscher Unterricht in hoheren Knabenschulen. W. 
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Leonhard, Dr. Der Unterricht im Deutschen. II. Teil. (Miindlicher 
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Realgymnasiums zu Dortmund, 1883. 

Liebmann, A. Sprachstorungen geistig zuriickgebliebenen Kinder. 
(Sammlung von Abhandlungen aus dem Gebiete der padagogische 
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Locker, Dr. Ueber den deutschen Unterricht auf Gymnasien. Pro- 
gramm des Gymnasiums zu Dillenburg, 1881. 

Lyon, O. Die Lektiire als Grundlage eines einheitlichen und natur- 
gemassen Unterrichts in der deutschen Sprache. 1. Thl., 2. Aufl. 
Leipzig: 1896. 

Zeitschrift fur den deutschen Unterricht, Jahrg. 12 : 15 Die Ziele 

des deutschen Unterrichts in unserm Zeitalter. 

Messer, Aug. Kritische Untersuchungen liber Denken, Sprechen und 
Sprachunterricht. (Sammlung von Abhandlungen aus dem Gebiete 
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Muller. Der Deutsche Unterricht auf Realschulen. Emden: 1892. 

Miiller, Jons. Quellenschrif ten und Geschichte des deutschsprachlichen 
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BIBLIOGRAPHY 369 

Nagel, L. Der deutsche Unterricht in der unteren Klassen der hoheren 

Biirgerschulen. Berlin : 1892. 
Nicklas, Johs. Methodische Winke fiir den deutschen Unterricht an 

den drei unteren Klassen hoherer Lehranstalten. Miinchen : 1894. 
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Prince, John T. Methods of Instruction and Organization of the Schools 

of Germany. Boston : 1892. Chapter IX Language. 
Richter, J. W. O. Der deutsche Unterricht an hoheren Schulen. 

Leipzig: 1876. 
Rieck, F. Padagogische Briefe. Bielefeld : 1867. 
Risler, C. Herrig's Archiv. 2 (1847): 364 Das psychologische und 

nationale Element im deutschen Sprachunterrichte. 
Russell, J. E. School Review 2 : 199 German in the Higher Schools 

of Germany. 
German Higher Schools. New York : 1899. Longmans. Chapter 

XII. 
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psychologische Studie. I. Die Anfange des Aufsatzes im dritten 

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Schrader, W. Erziehungs- und Unterrichtslehre fiir Gymnasien und 

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Schwab, E. Der deutsche Sprachunterricht in den obersten Gymnasial- 

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Strehl, "W. Der deutsche Aufsatz fiir die Mittelstufe hoheren Schulen. 

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Schulunterricht. Programm des Gymnasiums zu Liibben, 1855. 
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dere seiner Unterrichtsmethodik seit der Reformation. Vortrag. 

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Vigelius, W. Aus dem deutschen Unterricht in der Prima : der Lehrer- 

aufsatz als positive Korrektur der Schuler-aufsatze. Programm 

des Gymnasiums zu Frankfurt a. O., 1881. 
Volcker. Aufgaben des zu verstarkenden deutschen Unterrichts. 

Schonebeck : 1892. 
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H. Vollmar, Vom Unterricht in der Muttersprache. Zum Gedacht- 

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"Weisweiler, J. Ueber das Wesen und die Bedeutung der Chrie im 

deutschen Unterrichte. Programm des Marien-Gymnasiums zu 

Posen, 1892. 
Wendt, Gustav. Der deutsche Unterricht und die philosophische Pro- 

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Wendt, H. Die freie deutsche Arbeit in Prima. I. Programm des 

Gymnasiums in Rostock, 1857. 



VIII. The Teaching of French Composition in 

France 

Brunetiere, Ferd. Atlantic Monthly 80 : 442 Style in French Lit- 
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Revue de Deux Mondes, 1 Decembre, 1890 Apologie pour la 

rhetorique. 

Brunot, Ferd. Revue Universitaire, 15 Fevrier, 1895 Explications 
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Buisson, F. Dictionnaire de pedagogie et destruction primaire. 
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Carre, I. L'Enseignement de la lecture, de l'ecriture et de la langue 
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Chaignet, A. Ed. La rhetorique et son histoire. Paris : 1888. Pre- 
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Hartog, P. J. Fortnightly Magazine 77 : 1050 Teaching of Style in 
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Meunier, G. Revue Universitaire, 1898, Tome 2 : 241 Un projet 
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Payot, .Jules. Revue Universitaire 15 Juillet, 1897 L'Enseignement de 
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Salles, A. Revue Universitaire, 15 Decembre, 1895 De la composition 
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Stevens, Alice A. Harper 104 : 287 The Question of English. 

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IX. English in the Lower Grades 

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Barker, M. Ellen. Education 8 : 384 A Study in Elementary English. 

Bird, Hugh S. Southern Educational Association, 1900: 277 Lan- 
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Blair, Frank C. School and Home Education 18 : 24 Literary Tastes 
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Bowen, H. Courthope. Educational Times 49:211 The Uses of Fact , 
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Bright, Orville T. Addresses and Proceedings of the National Educa- 
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Brown, Geo. P. Public School Journal 9 : 259 On Teaching Reading ; 
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Fourth and Fifth Readers. 

Burt, Mary E. Literary Landmarks: A Guide to Good Reading for 
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Chubb, Percival. The Teaching of English in the Elementary and the 
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Collar, Geo., and Cnas. W. Crook. School Management and Methods 
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Compayre, Gabriel. Lectures on Pedagogy. Translated by W. H. 
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Crary, Agnes. Educational Review 14 : 457 Aspects of English Teach- 
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Currie, James. Common School Education. Edinburgh. Thomas 
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Davis, Lucy. Southern Educational Association, 1900 : 76 Literature 
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De Garmo, Charles. Teacher 4 : 66 The Language Problem in the 
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Dougherty, N. C. New England Journal of Education 21 : 212 Reading. 

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3/2 BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Farnham, George L. Addresses and Proceedings of the National 
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Garlick, A. H. A New Manual of Method. New York : 1896. Long- 
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Haliburton, M. W. Proceedings and Addresses of the Southern 
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Harrington, Henry F. Addresses and Proceedings of the National 
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Hall, Frank H. Journal of Pedagogy 14:214 The Transition in 
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Hall, G. Stanley. How to Teach Reading. Boston : 1887. Heath. 

Hughes, James L. Educational Review 2 : 162 Objective Method of 
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Hyde, Ellen. American Institute of Instruction 1892: 120-124 Eng- 
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Jones, L. H. New England Journal of Education 43 : 263 Composi- 
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Keeler, Harriet A. Addresses and Proceedings of the National 
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Lawrence, Isabel. Addresses and Proceedings of the National Ed- 
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McMurry, Chas. A. The Special Method in Reading of Complete 
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Marble, A. P. Addresses and Proceedings of the National Educa- 
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Maxwell, W. H. Educational Review 8:302 English in Grammar 
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Metcalf, Robert C. American Institute of Instruction 1884: 90 Lan- 
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How to Teach Language. Boston : 1888. Educational Publish- 
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Moses, Edward P. Education 15: 10 The Teaching of English Words 
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Ogden, John. Education 15 ^63 Language in Elementary Schools. 

Parker, Francis W. Educational Review 2 : 474 Objective Method of 
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Parker, Francis W. Talks on Pedagogics. New York and Chicago : 
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Macmillan. 

Public School Journal 12 : 593 Some Essentials of Good Reading. 

Pichards, Zalmon. Addresses and Proceedings of the National Educa- 
tional Association 1877 : 175 The English Language in Elementary 
Schools. 

Robinson, Robert. Teacher's Manual of Method and Organization. 
London : 1882. Longmans. Pp. 1-81. 

Salmon, David. The Art of Teaching. London, New York and Bom- 
bay: 1898. Longmans. Pp. 74-124. 

Sandison, Howard. Inland Educator 1:84, 155, 201, 285, 349; 2:48, 
105, 161 Method in Language. 

Schrieber, Mae E. Addresses and Proceedings of the National Educa- 
tional Association, 1 901 : 288 Literature in Grades below the 
High School. 

Scott, Harriet M., and Gertrude Buck Organic Education. Boston : 
1899. Heath. Chapter V. 

Scudder, Horace E. Atlantic Monthly 70 : 382 The Primer and 
Literature. 

Atlantic Monthly 73 : 252 The Educational Law of Reading and 

Writing. 

Shute, Katherine H. Education 12 : 138 Composition. 

School Review 10:332 The Teaching of English in the Elemen- 
tary Schools. 

Snoddy, James S. Education 20 : 353, 423 English Composition in 
Elementary Schools. 

Swett, John. Methods of Teaching. New York: 1880. Harper. 
Pp. 123-140, 189, 190. 

Thurber, S. Admonitions as to the Primary Teaching of English. 
Boston (1894). 

New England Journal of Education 40 : 344 What to do with 

English Literature in the Grammar Schools. 

Westcott, Oliver S. Addresses and Proceedings of the National Educa- 
tional Association 1900: 437 How shall we Teach our Pupils the 
Correct Use of the English Language ? 

White, Emerson E. The Elements of Pedagogy. Cincinnati and New 
York : 1886. Van Antwerp. Pp. 219-255. 



374 BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Wiltse, Sara E. Addresses and Proceedings of the National Educational 
Association 1894 : 691 What can the Kindergarten do for His- 
tory and Literature in the Higher Grades ? 

Young, Ella F. Addresses and Proceedings of the National Educational 
Association 1896: in Literature in Elementary Schools. Same 
article in New England Journal of Education 44 : 95, 98. 



X. Spelling and Spelling Reform 

Addresses and Proceedings of the National Educational Association 

1879 : 2 49~ 2 ^3 The Spelling-Reform Association. 
Balliet, Thos. M. Addresses and Proceedings of the National Educa- 
tional Association 1893 : 756 Some Association Tracks involved 

in Reading and Spelling. 
Carmen, E. Kate. Journal of Pedagogy 13 : 86 The Cause of Chronic 

Bad Spelling. 
Fernald, Frederick A. Popular Science Monthly 27 : 638 How Spelling 

Damages the Mind. Same article in Teacher 1 : 136. 
Gladstone, J. H. Spelling Reform from an Educational Point of View. 

London : 1878. Macmillan. 
Goodard, F. B. The Art of Spelling. New York: 1889. Baker. 
Gregory, John M. Present Age 1 : 356 How do we Learn to Spell? 

535 Spelling and Spelling. 
Haldeman, S. S. National Educational Association 1879 : 267 The 

Etymologic Objection to Spelling Reform. 
Harris, W. T. New England Journal of Education 53 : 216 Spelling 

Reform. 
Hill, T. Forum 7 : 185 A Way to Teach Spelling. 
Hodgson, W. B. Exaggerated Estimates of Reading and Writing as 

Means of Education. London : 1875. 
Jones, E. Addresses and Proceedings of the National Educational 

Association 1879 : 2 ^° Spelling Reform in England. 
Popular Education : A Revision of English Spelling a National 

Necessity. London : 1875. Pitman. 
Mann, Horace. Lectures on the Best Method of Preparing and Using 

the Spelling Book. Boston : 1841. 
March, F. A. Addresses and Proceedings of the National Educational 
Association 1879: 249 The Present State of the Spelling Reform 
in America. 

■ Forum 6 : 424 The Reign of Law in Spelling. 

New England Journal of Education 4 : 242 The Reform of English 

Spelling. (Opening address before the International Convention 
for the Amendment of English Orthography at Philadelphia, Aug. 

15,1876.) 
The Spelling Reform. Washington: 1893. Bureau of Education. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 375 

March, F. A. Transactions of the American Philological Association, 
Vol. XII. p. 51 The New Spellings of the Philological Society of 
London ; Vol. XVII. p. 127 Joint List of Amended Spellings. 

Miiller, Max. On Spelling. London : 1880. Pitman. 

North, S. N. D. Addresses and Proceedings of the National Educational 
Association 1879: 271 Spelling Reform in Journalism. 

Rice, J. M. Forum 23 : 163, 409 Futility of the Spelling Grind. 

New England Journal of Education 48 : 190 An Ideal Spelling 

Course. 

Scott, C. P. G. New England Journal of Education 56 : 104 Simplifica- 
tion of English Spelling a Present Duty. 

Sweet, Henry. A Handbook of Phonetics, including an Exposition of 
the Principles of Spelling Reform. Oxford : 1877. Clarendon 
Press. 

Swett, John. Public School Journal 12:600 Hints on Teaching 
Spelling. 

Thomas, Calvin. Publications of the Modern Language Association of 
America, Vol. XVII. p. 297 The Amelioration of our Spelling. 

Vickroy, T. R. Addresses and Proceedings of the National Educational 
Association 1881 : 88 The Necessity for Spelling Reform. 

"Wyckoff, Adelaide E. Addresses and Proceedings of the National Edu- 
cational Association 1893 : 762 Constitutional Bad Spellers. 



INDEX 



Allusions, literary, 167-168, 253. 

Alphabet method, 98, 107, 108. 

Analytic method of teaching read- 
ing, 103, 108-112. 

Anglo-Saxon, 20, 215-218. 

Anomalous forms, 107, ill, 1 12. 

Assignment, philosophy of, 319- 
326. 

" Bad " English, 225. 
Bible, the, in schools, 96, 97. 
Biography, literary, 179, 281. 

Character, study of, in literature, 

260-261. 
Classics versus school-readers, 184- 

187. 
College entrance requirements, 

283-292. 
Common sense, value of, in theme 

correcting, 339, 340. 
Communication and expression, 

3 2 4, 3 2 5- 

(Comparative literature, 318. 

[Composition, aims in teaching, 123, 
v 124, 334; and literature, 137, 138, 
235, 236; in secondary schools, 
218-244; oral, 127, 244, 245; 
subjects for, 124-130, 133-138, 
233" 2 39» 3 20 "3 2 3 > text-books in, 
141. 

Correction of themes, 142-144, 
242-244, 314, 315, 327-341; im- 
promptu, 315, note. 
Correlation of studies, 136, 137, 
177-179. 



Course of study in English, 293- 

302. 
Critical study of literature, 174-176, 

255-258, 278-281. 
Curriculum, modern, 69-71. 

Declamation, 247. 

Diagrams of sentences, 149, 204. 

Dialect, 55. 

Dictation, 128. 

Discipline, value of, 78, 79. 

Drama, study of, 276-278. 

Drill, in grammar, 148, 202-204; 

in phonetics, 101, 102, no, in ; 

in spelling, 153. 

Elementary schools, the teach- 
ing of English in : alphabet 
method, 98 ; analytic method, 
103, no; beginnings of reading, 
98-120; composition, aims in 
teaching, 123, 124; compositions, 
correction of, 142-144; composi- 
tion exercises, 127-135; com- 
position subjects, 124-127; 
course of study, 293-300 ; gen- 
eral conditions, 68-75 ; grammar, 
144-152 ; literature and composi- 
tion, 137-140 ; literature, its 
place and its value, 155-163; 
literature, the teaching of, 164- 
187; methods, sentence and 
word, 108 ; models, use of, 135, 
136; oral work, n 2-1 14, 118, 
119; phonetics, 100-102, 109- 
113; place of English, 75-81; 



37$ 



INDEX 



primary reading, 81-98 ; reading 
aloud, 118, 119; spelling, 152- 

I55 \ 
Elocution, 246. 

England, teaching of English in, 
26-30. 

English, a single subject, 1 39-1 41, 
i83; essential elements, 189; 
irregularities of, 107, in, 112; 
Old and Middle, 20, 215-218; 
schoolmaster's, 309 ; self-culti- 
vation in, 309 ; teaching of, in 
England, 26-30; in the United 
States, 37-52 ; see Elementary 
schools, Secondary schools. 

Essay-correction, 327-341. 

Essays, the study of, 269-271. 

Etymology, 212, 213. 

Expression and communication, 

3 2 4, 3 2 5- 
Expression in reading, 114, 115, 
118, 119. 

Fables, 94, 95. 

Fairy stories, 94. 

Foreign influences in the schools, 

73, 74- 

German school-readers, early, 83- 
86. 

German, teaching of, in Germany, 
31-36, 82-86, 99-103. 

Grammar, beginnings of, 146, 147 ; 
how much, 150, 151, 201-204, 
206, 211, 212 ; in the elementary 
schools, 144-152; in the second- 
ary schools, 190-214;. methods 
of teaching, 146-149, 198-212; 
purpose of, 145, 146, 191-198; 
text-books of, 151 ; teacher's 
equipment in, 316, 317. 

History of literature, 282. 

Idioms, foreign, 73, 74. 
Illustrative material, 170-172, 376. 
Imagination, appeal to, 76, 77, 



79, 80, 91-96, 160, 161, 169-172, 

324. 

Interest, arousal of, 323, 324; im- 
portance of, 77, 79, III. 

Interests, student, 322, 323. 

Languages, foreign, teacher's 
equipment in, 313. 

Latin, as a linguistic discipline, 19; 
as a part of English, 24; in ed- 
ucation, 9; in literature, 7; in 
modern education, 16 ; versus the 
vernaculars, 5. 

Lesson-plans, 179-182. 

Letter-writing, 127. 

Libraries, use of, 184. 

Literary unity, 76-77, 80. 

Literature and composition, their 
relation, 137, 138, 235-239. 

Literature and science, 157. 

Literature, as a subject of study, 
I 55~ I 57» 164, 166-183; as por- 
trayal of life, 158-160; compar- 
ative, 318 ; for children, 90-98 ; 
history of, 282 ; its ethical in- 
fluence, 162-163; its place in the 
schools, 155-163; oral, 165-166; 
teacher's equipment in, 310, 311, 
3 J 7. 318 

Method, alphabet, 98, 107, 108 ; 
analytic, 103, 108-112; teaching 
composition, 138, 141-144; ne- 
cessity of, 179, 180, 278-281 ; 
sentence, 108 ; word, 108. 

Models, use of, 135, 136. 

Modern school-readers, 90. 

New England Primer, 86-89. 

Nonsense rhymes, 91. 

" Normal " words and sentences, 

115, 116. 
Novel, development of, 257, 259; 

study of, 259-268 ; historical, 

264-266. 

Old and Middle English, 20, 215- 
218. 



INDEX 



379 



Old English, teacher's equipment 

in, 313- 
Oral composition, 244-249. 
Oral work, importance of, 99-104, 

109-115, 118,119, 127. 
Outlines in composition work, 132- 

134- 

Paragraph structure, study of, 

I3 1 ' T 3 2 - 
Paraphrasing, 129, 237-239. 

Parsing and analysis, 149, 203, 204. 

Personality in literature, 254-257, 
263, 264. 

Phonetics, emphasis upon, 99-102, 
104, 1 09-1 14. 

Pictures for schools, dealers in, 
375; use and value of, 105, 126, 
170-172. 

Poetry, for children, 97 ; the teach- 
ing of, 271-281. 

Primary reading matter, 81-98; 
development of, 81-98. 

Primer, New England, 86-89. 

Primers, early German, 83, 84. 

Primitive life, literature of, 93. 

Readers, school. See Primary 
reading matter. 

Reading aloud, 118, 119, 248 ; ap- 
preciative and critical, 310; 
courses of, 311 ; rapid, 120, 183. 

Reproduction of stories, 129. 

Rhetoric, advanced study of, 315, 
316; in secondary schools, 218- 
244. 

School readers. See Classics ver- 
sus school readers ; Literature 
for children ; and Primary read- 
ing matter. 

Script, 116, 117. 

Secondary schools, teaching of 
English in : " bad " English, 225 ; 
college entrance requirements, 
283-292 ; correction of essays, 
242-244, 3 T 4, 3 l S, 3 2 7-34i; course 



of study, 300-302 ; critical study 
of literature, 255-258, 278-281 ; 
declamation, 247 ; drama, study 
of the, 276-278 ; elocution, 246 ; 
essay, study of the, 269 ; etymol- 
ogy, 212 ; grammar, 190-214 ; his- 
tory of literature, 282 ; literary 
allusions, 253 ; literary interpreta- 
tion, 261 ; literary structure, 253 ; 
method, the question of, 278 ; 
novel, study of, 259-268 ; Old 
and Middle English, 215; oral 
composition, 244 ; paraphrasing, 
237 ; parsing and analysis, 203 ; 
poetry, the study of, 271 ; read- 
ing aloud, 248 ; rhetoric and 
English composition, 218 ; style, 
232, 270 ; synonyms, 229 ; trans- 
lation, 233 ; verse-writing, 240 ; 
word study, 252. 

Sentence method, 108. 

Sentence structure, study of, 130, 

di- 
spelling, 152-155. 

Structure of sentences, 130, 131 ; 

literary, 172-174, 253, 260. 
Style, 232, 270, 271. 
Subjects for composition, choice 

of, 124-T30, i33-i3 8 > 2 33~ 2 39> 

320-323. 
Sympathy, value of, 324. 
Synonyms, 229. 

Teachers, training of, 72, 305- 

3i3. 
Teaching of reading, first steps in, 

109-116; history of, 98-106. 
Transcription, 128. 
Translation, 233. 

United States, teaching of Eng- 
lish in, 37-52. 

Unity, literary and scientific, 76, 
78, 80. 

Vernaculars, general theory of 
instruction in, 52-66; in educa- 



38o 



INDEX 



tion, 9; in modern education, 
16; teaching of in Europe, 26; 
teaching of, in the United States, 

37-52. 
Verse-writing, 240. 



Webster Speller, 89. 
Word method, 108. 
Words, the study of, 167, 212, 213, 
252, 253. 



APPENDIX 



DEALEBS IN PHOTOGRAPHS AND PRINTS. 

New York. The Cosmos Pictures Co., 129 Broadway. 
Pictures at two and one-half cents each. 

The Helman-Taylor Art Co., 257 Fifth Avenue. Publishers 
of Harper's black and white prints, at one cent each. 

The Perry Pictures Co., 76 Fifth Avenue. Pictures at one 
cent each. 

Alfred Hart, 219 West 109th Street. Small blue prints at 
one cent each. 

The J. C. Witter Co., 123 Fifth Avenue. 

The Berlin Photographic Co., 14 East 23d Street. 

Brown Clement & Co., 249 Fifth Avenue. 

Frank Hegger, 288 Fifth Avenue. 

George Busse, 12 West 28th Street. 

A. W. Elson & Co., 14 West 29th Street. 

Boston. Soule Photograph Co., 338 Washington Street. 

Philadelphia. London Art Publishers, 1624 Chestnut 
Street. 

Syracuse, N. Y. Earl Thompson & Co. Blue prints, one 
cent each. 

Leipzig, Germany. Wachsmuth, publisher of colored prints 
representing stages in the development of civilization, and of 
other pictures for use in schools. 

Voigtlander, dealer in school pictures. 

Teubner, publisher. School pictures. 



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Scott's Woodstock. 

Edited, with Introduction and Notes, by Bliss Perry, A.M., formerly 
Professor of Oratory and ^Esthetic Criticism in Princeton University. 

Cloth, $0.75 

Shakspere's As You Like It. 

With an Introduction by Barrett Wendell, A.B., Professor of Eng- 
lish in Harvard University ; and Notes by William Lyon Phelps, 
Ph.D., Assistant Professor of English Literature in Yale University. 

Cloth, $0.60 

Shakspere's Macbeth. 

Edited, with Introduction and Notes, by John Matthews Manley, 
Ph.D., Professor of English in the University of Chicago. 

Cloth, $0.50; boards, $0.40 

[For Study, 1903 to 1905. For Reading, 1906 to 1908.] 
Shakspere's Merchant of Venice. 

Edited, with Introduction and Notes, by Francis B. Gummere, Ph.D., 
Professor of English in Haverford College. Cloth, $0.50; boards, $0.40 

[For Reading, 1903 to 1908.] 
Shakspere's Julius Caesar, 

Edited, with Introduction and Notes, by GEORGE C. D. Odell, Ph.D., 
Tutor in Rhetoric and English Composition in Columbia University. 
With portrait of Shakspere. Cloth, $0.50; boards, $0.40 

[For Reading, 1903, 1904, 1905. For Study, 1906 to 1908.] 

Shakspere's A Midsummer Night's Dream. 

Edited, with Introduction and Notes, by George Pierce Baker, 
A. B. , Assistant Professor in Harvard University. Cloth, $0.60 

The introduction is especially designed to show the picturesqueness of 
Shakspere' 's lime, and the conditions of life in the London of 1600. 



Longmans, Green, &- Co.'s Publications, 



Longmans' English Classics* — Continued* 
The Sir Roger de Coverley Papers. 

From "The Spectator." Edited by D. O. S. Lowell, A.M., of the 
Roxbury Latin School, Roxbury, Mass. Cloth, $0.50; boards, $0.40 

[For Reading, 1903 to 1908.] 

Southey's Life of Nelson. 

Edited, with Introduction and Notes, by Edwin L. Miller, A.M., of 
the Englewood High School, Illinois. Cloth, $0. 75 

Tennyson's Idylls of the King: Gareth and Lynette, 
The Passing of Arthur, Lancelot and Elaine. 

Edited, with Introduction and Notes, by Sophie C. Hart, Associate 
Professor of Rhetoric in Wellesley College. 

Cloth, $0.50; boards, $0.40 
[For Reading, 1906, 1907, 1908.] 

Tennyson's The Princess. 

Edited, with Introduction and Notes, by George Edward Wood- 
berry, A.B., Professor of Literature in Columbia University. 

Cloth, $0.50; boards, $0.40 
[For Reading, 1903, 1904, 1905.] 

Webster's First Bunker Hill Oration. 

Together with other Addresses relating to the Revolution. Edited, with 
Introduction and Notes, by Fred Newton Scott, Ph.D., Professor 
of Rhetoric in the University of Michigan. Cloth, $0.60 



Prof. C. B. Bradley, University 
of California ; Member of English 
Conference of the National Commit- 
tee of Ten : — "Admirably adapted to 
accomplish what you intend — to in- 
terest young persons in thoughtful 
reading of noble literature. The 
help given seems just what is need- 
ed ; its generosity is not of the sort 
to make the young student unable to 
help himself. I am greatly pleased 
with the plan and with its execution. " 

Prof. Katherine Lee Bates, 

Wellesley College : — -"The series is 
admirably planned, the ' Sugges- 
tions to Teachers ' being a peculiarly 
valuable feature." 

Principal George H. Browne, 

Cambridge, Mass. : — " It is the most 
attractive, most consistent, most prac- 
ticable, and, at the same time, most 



scholarly series for college prepara- 
tion yet produced." 

Byron Groce, Master in English, 
Boston Latin School : — "Asa series 
the books have two strong points : 
there is a unity of method in editing 
that I have seen in no other series : 
the books are freer from objections 
in regard to the amount and kind of 
editing than any other series I 
know." 

Charles C. Ramsay, Principal 
of Durfee High School, Fall River, 
Mass.: — "The introductions, the 
suggestions to teachers, the chrono- 
logical tables, and the notes are most 
admirable in design and execution. 
The editor-in-chief and his associates 
have rendered a distinct service to 
secondary schools." 



AMERICAN TEACHERS SERIES 

Edited by JAMES E. RUSSELL, Ph.D. 

DEAN OP TEACHERS COLLEGE, COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY 



In all One field of education there are no problems more difficult to 
solve than those pertaining to the work of the secondary school. What 
is the aim of secondary education ? What is its function in modern 
society? What knowledge is of most worth? What means and 
methods produce the best results ? Such questions as these come to 
every secondary teacher and demand an answer. The most encourag- 
ing sign of the times is the growth of a teaching profession pledged to 
study these problems intelligently and to find some rational solution 
of them. 

The " American Teachers Series " will review the principal subjects 
of the secondary school curriculum,, The purpose is to discuss the 
educational value of each subject, the reasons for including it in the 
curriculum, the selection and arrangement of materials in the course, 
the essential features of class instruction, and the various helps which 
are available for teachers' use. The books are not intended to correct 
the faults of ignorant teaching ; they are not put forth as manuals of 
infallible methods. They are designed to be contributions to the pro- 
fessional knowledge necessary in secondary education, and are ad- 
dressed to teachers of liberal culture and special scholarship who are 
seeking to make their knowledge more useful to their pupils and their 
pupils more useful to the State. — From the Editor's Preface* 



The following volumes are either in preparation or already published: 

The Teaching of Latin and Greek. By Professors Charles E. Ben- 
nett and George P. Bristol, Cornell University. Crown 8vo. 354 
pages. $1.50 

The Teaching of History and Civics. By Professor Henry E. 
Bourne, Western Reserve University. Crown*8vo. 395 pages. $1.50 

The Teaching of Chemistry and Physics. By Professors Alex- 
ander Smith, University of Chicago, and Edwin H. Hall, Harvard 
University. Crown 8vo. 384 pages. $1.50 

The Teaching of English. By Professors George R. Carpenter and 
Franklin T. Baker, of Columbia University, and Professor Fred 
Newton Scott, of the University of Michigan. 390 pages. $1.50 

The Teaching of Mathematics. By Professor J. W. A. Young, Uni- 
versity of Chicago. 

The Teaching of Biology. By Professors Francis E. Lloyd and 
Maurice E. Bigelow, Teachers College. 

Manual Training. By Professor Charles R. Richards, Teachers 
College. 



SJARY OF CONGRESS 



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